I saw it this morning. Diagnosed cases of Covid-19 by local authority in England (I just looked at the North). So I got all the data together to reproduce this map, the proposed popular interpretation of which I have reproduced in MS Paint.

I'm now pretty (75%?) sure that it's just an artefact of testing efficiency. Former industrial areas are urban and deprived and we're testing more people in urban and deprived areas. So there are more positives there.

Excess deaths is the way to know where is really getting hit hardest by Covid-19. So here's my best guess at excess deaths by local authority. Much of post-industrial Yorkshire and Lancashire getting off lightly. Cheshire, Cumbria, North Yorkshire getting hit hard.

I increasingly think that we're doing a bad job at analysing this stuff in England. And that we've created a culture where it is hard/costly to discuss that. I hope I'm wrong on both counts.