The rise in cases has been linked to reports that Leicester could be made subject to Britain's first local lockdown.
When asked on BBC One's The Andrew Marr Show whether the city was going to see new restrictions imposed, Ms Patel said:"Well, that is correct.
It stopped short of saying a local lockdown was likely, but The Sunday Times reported that the health secretary had been examining legal aspects of the shutdown following a rise in cases. He argued the information was"key to determining what intervention is needed" to respond to the recent surge in COVID-19 cases.
He said:"The... thing that is becoming clear now is that when outbreaks occur, they typically occur in clusters and we're seeing certain work environments, for example food-processing factories, as being fairly common places for those clusters to arise.
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