Hertfordshire has one of the lower rates of new coronavirus cases in the country, Public Health England figures have shown today.

Today's data is the most accurate and up-to-date and gives an indication of how many people living in the county currently have the virus.

This is because the data takes into account those who have been tested in hospitals, as well as in the community - for example at a mobile testing centre or at home.

For the week ending June 28, Hertfordshire had a Covid-19 case rate of 2.4 per 100,000 people, which is down from 4.6 the week previously.

With a population of around 1.2 million, this data suggests around 25 people living in Hertfordshire tested positive for coronavirus between June 21 and June 28.

Over the whole pandemic, Hertfordshire's coronavirus case rate is 342 per 100,000 people.

This suggests around 4,000 people in the county have officially tested positive for the virus - this does not take into account those who have had the virus but were never tested for it.

Daily government figures show a little over 3,000 people living in the county have tested positive but this is only for people tested in hospital or laboratory settings.

Nearly 50 local authorities have recorded a rate lower than 2.4 in the last week, with around 100 recording a higher rate.

The highest rate, unsurprisingly considering it has been put into lockdown again, is Leicester with a latest weekly rate of 141.3 cases per 100,000 people.

Bradford is second on the list with 45.8 cases per 100,000 people.

The Government and Public Health England (PHE) have been criticised this week for not sharing coronavirus case and testing data which can be vital to halting local outbreaks.

The Mayor of Leicester said he had been trying for weeks to access data on the level of testing in the city and was only given access on Thursday - days before the city's local lockdown was announced.

Other council leaders, mayors and MPs have added their voices to the debate, also saying they have not been able to access the data they need to identify and tackle local outbreaks.

What is the difference between Pillar 1 and Pillar 2 testing and why are both important?

Pillar one data is the number of confirmed cases of Covid-19 based on swab testing in PHE labs and NHS hospitals for those with a clinical need and health and care workers.

Pillar two is swab testing of the wider population and includes data from all community testing, drive-through centres and tests sent to people's homes.

The Department of Health and Social Care publishes the complete testing data on a national level, it only publishes the pillar one figures for individual local authorities.

It is not clear why it does not publish pillar two data on a local level.

Using only pillar one figures will not give a complete picture of what is happening in a local area because it is limited to confirmed cases in patients and health and care workers.