London (CNN Business) The UK economy shrank by a record 5.8% in March as the coronavirus caused huge swaths of business to seize up and the government imposed measures to contain the pandemic. The contraction is the worst since monthly record keeping began in 1997, according to the UK Office for National Statistics. "With the arrival of the pandemic nearly every aspect of the economy was hit in March, dragging growth to a record monthly fall," said Jonathan Athow, an economic statistician at the Office for National Statistics. "Services and construction saw record declines on the month with education, car sales and restaurants all falling substantially," he added. "March's GDP figures showed that the UK economy was already in freefall within two weeks of the lockdown going into effect.

Source: CNN May 13, 2020 07:29 UTC