A Covid snapshot: 28m UK households to take part in census unlike any other

Pandemic likely to skew answers on work and health in England, Wales and Northern Ireland

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Twenty-eight million households are preparing for their Covid close-up on Sunday in what may be the last official census after 180 years of mass data gathering once a decade.

The mandatory questionnaire will largely be answered online for the first time, and statisticians are looking at the possibility of using other digital data sources to provide the information gleaned from many of the 50 questions in a survey that is expected to cost 900m.