The Government has launched an investigation into why a high proportion of coronavirus cases are people from ethnic minority backgrounds.

A spokesperson for the Prime Minister said the study would be led by the NHS and Public Health England.

An independent race equality think tank, The Runnymede Trust, had previously warned of the affects coronavirus would have on minorities. The trust cited health, social and economic inequalities as factors.

The first ten doctors to die from the virus were from BAME backgrounds. 

Analysis by Sky also found that out of the 54 frontline health and social care workers who have died, 70 per cent of them had BAME backgrounds.

Dr David Bailey from the British Medical Association said: "We absolutely need to know that because we need to be able to advise our members whether or not they need to treat themselves differently in terms of their risk profiles."

While Dr Zubaida Haque of The Runnymede Trust said: "We are living in extraordinary times, where we have been caught off-guard by a global health crisis, which puts into sharp relief the existing inequalities in our societies. 

"The British Government has the overwhelming challenge of plugging the rapid rise in unemployment, strengthening the safety net for those who are unable to earn, and protecting the vulnerable.

"Very few people will be immune from the health or economic consequences of COVID-19, but major differences will occur in how people from different ethnic and socio-economic groups will be able to recover from the impact.  

"Now more than ever, the government must protect all our communities from the desperate times which still lay ahead."

And the chairman of the British Medical Association, Dr Chaand Nagpaul, told The Guardian: "At face value, it seems hard to see how this can be random – to have the first 10 doctors of all being of Bame background. 

"Not only that, we also know that in terms of the Bame population, they make up about a third of those in intensive care. There’s a disproportionate percentage of Bame people getting ill."