80 new Covid-19 cases in Edinburgh and Lothians as Sturgeon says country will take 'baby steps' when easing lockdown

There are two fewer people in hospital.

A total of 80 new Covid-19 cases have been confirmed in the NHS Lothian area in the last 24 hours, as a further 64 people with the virus died in Scotland.

The latest government figures, published at 2pm today, reveal an increase from 1,604 to 1,684 cases of Covid-19 in the NHS Lothian area.

There are now 275 people in hospital with suspected or confirmed Covid-19, two fewer than yesterday, and 26 people in the ICU, a decrease of one since yesterday.

The figures were announced at 2pm.

It comes as First Minister Nicola Sturgeon confirmed that a further 64 people have died with the virus in Scotland since yesterday.

A total of 9,697 people have tested positive in Scotland, and there are 1,710 patients in hospital.

Nicola Sturgeon said this morning that the country will take ‘baby steps’ when easing lockdown restrictions.

"We will have to be very careful, very cautious, because the virus will have been suppressed but it will not have gone away,” she told the BBC’s Good Morning Scotland.

"We will have to live with it for some time,” she added.

The Scottish Government released a paper on Thursday detailing how lockdown measures could be eased in the future.

Nicola Sturgeon described the paper, which she says more than 250,000 people have now read, as an "attempt to have a grown up conversation with the wider public" on the issue.