CHARITIES hit by the coronavirus outbreak are set to receive £750million, the chancellor has announced at Downing Street today.

Speaking at the daily No 10 news conference, Rishi Sunak said it will include £370 million for small local charities working with vulnerable people - with £60 million allocated through the Barnett formula to those in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland.

A further £360 million will go to charities providing essential services supporting vulnerable people, with £200 million to hospices and the rest to organisations like St John Ambulance and the Citizens Advice Bureau.

Mr Sunak said it was essential to support the organisations helping those most in need due to the outbreak.

"For them shutting up shop at this moment would be to contravene their very purpose, their entire reason to exist," he said.

Mr Sunak said the Government would match pound-for-pound whatever the public donated in the BBC's Big Night In charity appeal.

Meanwhile, Professor Angela McLean said the spread of the virus is not accelerating.

She said: "This count of new cases in the UK, day by day over the last few weeks, is not accelerating out of control.

"Yesterday, there were 5,492 new cases and the spread of the virus is not accelerating and that is good news."

NHS England's national medical director Stephen Powis urged people needing emergency treatment to seek help "just as you always have done".

He told the daily press conference: "The NHS has worked night and day to surge capacity to manage coronavirus but it's also there for you if you have symptoms of a stroke, symptoms of a heart attack.

"Indeed if you have any emergency condition whether it's a sick child, whether it's a mother in pregnancy who's worried about movements of the baby, you should be seeking emergency services just as you always have done.

"They are there for you and, although we are focusing on coronavirus, it's important we continue to focus on other emergency conditions."