One of Scotland’s top health experts has warned of a fourth wave of coronavirus this winter.

Professor Jason Leitch told a Scottish Government briefing that there would likely be another wave, however he “would not expect” another lockdown.

The national clinical director told journalists: “I don’t think this is the last time we need to be concerned about Covid.

"Most of the epidemiologists think there will be some kind of ‘winter wave’ along with flu and respiratory viruses, we just don’t know the scale of it.

"Vaccination appears to be really helping us now and we hope booster doses, protecting the vulnerable and continuing with some hygiene measures – and we’ll hear more about those baseline measures next week – will help us keep that to a minimum.

"But we will treat every wave at the moment we get in an appropriate way.

"I don’t expect to lockdown for wave four, but I expect we might have to adjust some things depending on what we find in the data and the advice we give the First Minister."

Earlier in the briefing, Nicola Sturgeon said there are "strong grounds for hope" that Scotland will be able to lift most Covid restrictions on August 9 as planned.

The First Minister said case numbers have more than halved in the past three weeks while hospital admissions are also falling.

She said the Scottish Government will decide next week whether to go ahead with the move "beyond Level Zero" on August 9. 

However, she continued to warn of the need for caution as she announced seven deaths of coronavirus patients and 1044 new cases in the previous 24 hours.

She said: "This time next week I'll make a statement to the Scottish Parliament setting out whether and to what extent we think we're able to go ahead with that.

"What we'll be doing between now and then is weighing up the different factors that will inform that decision.

"Several of these factors give us really strong grounds for hope and that's positive, although others remind us of the need for continued caution."

Ms Sturgeon said Scotland is in a "much better place" than it was at the start of the pandemic, or even at the beginning of this month.

She added: "Case number have more than halved in the past three weeks."

The average test positivity rate has also fallen, she said, and is now the lowest it has been since the middle of June. 

Ms Sturgeon added: "To put all this in comparative terms within the UK, at the start of this month Scotland accounted for five of the top 10 local authority Covid hotspots across the UK. 

"At this stage, we have none in the top 150 local authority hotspots across the UK."