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TAOISEACH MICHEÁL MARTIN has said if the country reaches 2,000 Covid cases per day, it would be very challenging for the contact tracing system.
Speaking at Government Buildings yesterday, he announced that Ireland will introduce fresh lockdown measures beginning on Christmas Eve – with various restrictions kicking in in the following days and weeks.
He said the Government was acting “quickly and aggressively” to try to suppress the soaring case numbers.
Yesterday, a further 970 new cases of Covid-19 were confirmed in Ireland, with 13 deaths recorded.
Tánaiste Leo Varadkar said if no action was taken, and cases continues to rise at the same trajectory they are, the country could hit 2,000 cases by New Year’s Eve.
There is capacity to handle 140,000 tests per week, with the Taoiseach confirming yesterday that there are 700 contact tracers employed.
In October, when there was a spike in cases, the contact tracing system was near collapse, with the HSE being forced to ask more than 2,000 people who received a positive Covid-19 test result during a particular week to alert their own close contacts.
The HSE said at the time that this was due to the “unprecedented pressure” on Ireland’s contact tracing system over that week.
Contact tracers normally inform close contacts of infected cases of their status and help arrange for them to be tested.
When asked if the contact tracing system could handle the mounting case numbers, particularly if they hit the 2,000 mark, Martin said:
That would be very challenging, that would be difficult.
The Taoiseach said the HSE had informed him that they had increased the contact tracing workforce, confirming there are now 700 contact tracers employed.
He added:
If you get up to 2,000 that is reaching very significant levels which would challenge contact tracing.
New restrictions
Ireland is returning to the highest level of its Covid-19 response – Level 5 – with some adjustments, such as allowing shops to remain open.
The measures will initially remain in place until January 12.
Martin said the government was making decisions on the assumption that the new UK variant of Covid-19 was already in Ireland.
“We have to act as if this mutant variant is in the country – we don’t have definitive proof, but clearly something is going on there in terms of the change, the scale and rapidity of the growth,” he said.
The Taoiseach confirmed that there is no evidence this new variant has had an impact on hospitalisations in the UK.
Concern over the strain has led to a slew of European countries, including Ireland, suspending flights from Britain.
UK health officials have said that initial modelling and research suggests that the new variant may be 70% more infectious that other strains.
However, this week, Irish public health experts, such as the director of the National Virus Reference Laboratory Dr Cillian De Gascun, said the strain is “a cause for concern” but that the evidence is not there yet to say for sure that it is more infectious.
“I don’t think we have seen the evidence for that interpretation at this point in time,” he said.
Certainly there are significant case numbers in various regions of the UK and it has become the dominant strain over the last four or five weeks, certainly it’s a cause for concern. There are some genetic markers that might explain why it would be more infective, and perhaps might be more efficient at transmitting, but we haven’t seen the hard evidence for that.
Despite this, De Gascun said that due to the infection rates in the southeast of the UK it is “quite important and prudent” to operate on a precautionary basis.
Chair of NPHET’s modelling group Professor Philip Nolan also said this week:
It’s not to say the new variant is here or isn’t here, there’s no evidence that it is, there’s no need to read these rapidly high case counts as evidence that it must be here.
“It’s clear from the level of social contact that we’re seeing that this could account for those very high growth rates,” he said.
New variant
Martin acknowledged that a body of work had to be done on the impact of the new variant, but said there has been a rise in the case numbers, regardless.
“There is without question a rapid increase in the cases – the actual reason for that – is it socialisation? Or the variant of the virus – the mutant variant? Or is it a combination of both?”
He said he spoke to UK experts yesterday morning about the new variant.
“They are confident that this variant is responsible for increased transmission. They are growing more and more confident, they have to do more research, I acknowledge that,” he said.
“But a lot of people believe it is inconceivable that it would not be in Ireland given our close proximity to the UK and people travelling over,” he said.
The Taoiseach said the government does have to apply a “precautionary principle”, stating:
“We do have to work on the basis that it’s here. I think it would be irresponsible if we worked on the basis that it wasn’t here.”
“The figures speak for themselves in terms of growth. Something different has happened in the last ten days, there is no doubt about that.”
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That’s very sad many people lost their jobs because pub are closed.
I am foreign but I know going to pub is very Irish tradition probably many places will be closed permanently. If you are young is fine but there is a lot of people over 50 working in pubs probably for most of their lives I wonder if doing any training going to change anything.
I hope this is last lockdown and maybe some of the places are going to be saved.
@artur filip: Well said. Completely agree
After being trained in these hospitality lessons will they be “fully trained” or will they need to “work as a trainee waiter for free for a year in order to become a real waiter that gets paid” kind of scenario?
A very FG thing to do. A loophole that often gets abused.
@Dean: incredibly cynical view. They are upskilling people in the industry so they can do other things or be better able to go up the ranks. In other words an existing waiter learns finances so they can become a manger or change industry. Why people want to blame one party is a mystery. Do you think any other party would really come up and be able to implement something better? Civil servants have more to do with this than the government
@Craic_a_tower: Everyone can’t ‘move up the ranks’.
@Craic_a_tower:
I finished college at 22 with a degree. Every employer wanted at least 2 years of experience. So if a salary was 40 thousand, that meant that it’s loss of 80 thousand. If you learn as you work in a company, you’re still working and thus should get paid. That shouldn’t be a big ask; work is work.
Essentially a college grad’s first full-time pay check is at age 24. Some people have kids by then, need to sleep somewhere during this time, and eat food during, surprisingly.
To add to that, from 2011, FG ushered in all these unpaid positions: internships, placements, trainee worker, student worker, jobbridge, work to become a worker.
I later upskilled and again employers wanted 2 years of work experience for that position, which meant more internships. These are barriers.
This is key FG policy. They attract business by offering the Irish workforce as free labour. It’s peak dystopian capitalism. Working for free in the hope of getting the job we already work doing (internship).
Businesses will happily exploit, and FG and FF offer those conditions. Workers want to be paid for working—which shouldn’t be a radical idea—and workers have basically all the other parties who fight for less worker barriers.
@Jim Lingk: Exactly, A) there are fewer positions “up the ladder” which should be obvious. B) obviously people who put in the time, effort and money to get a qualification should be rewarded for that but it really shouldn’t be a controversial stance that every working person should be able to afford things like home ownership and childcare costs? We’re literally precluding people from having a home and family because of the perceived “value” of their work. Just because someone works retail or hospitality does not make them some sort of untermensch. Especially considering how many of their jobs have been classed as “essential”.
@Jim Lingk: there’s research on that – probably 80% of people can, and it’s important to give 100% of people the opportunity. This is no time for cynicism and bickering – everyone wants everyone to have the chance to work.
@Dean: starting wage as a graduate is not €40k most or even vaguely possible. I agree you should be paid for work and nobody in my industry does what you are suggesting. College graduate outside a few select industries also don’t do what you are suggesting. There are entry level jobs more than nonpaying internships in this country.
It still isn’t relevant to what is going on here
@Jim Lingk: But they could move from one closed Pup to another closed Pup
Luckily I haven’t been out of work this year, but I do think it’s funny that as a hospitality worker, along with many others I have worked with, I have achieved a higher level of further education than our minister for higher education. Do FF/FG really not see the optics of a college dropout getting paid 6 figures to tell people that they need to go to college? Do they really not care how out of touch they look with working people?
@Liam Edward Harris: should he advise everybody to drop out of college for a six-figure salary?
@Alan McArdle: he should probably be qualified for the job he’s doing. Being pals with Frances Fitzgerald and Leo doesn’t count.
Dara calleary’s pissing and moaning about not getting a ministerial role sums up the issue with the positions. He didn’t care what department he was in charge of he just knew he should be in charge of A department. Experience, expertise, interest, knowledge be damned because ministerial roles are just promotions handed out for loyal service
I knew that the hospitality sector wouldn’t recover fully. But this headline makes me sad.
There’s nothing like an adventure and a bowl of ribs and a glass of Guinness of a Sunday after working all week.
I would holiday in Ireland above anywhere for the craic and the people.
I also think we’re raising a bunch of offended drones who will never get to explore life and individuality through the experiences of letting it all go at a nightclub or seeing a band that might be famous in 10 years or flirting with the doorman. (Happy V day babe)
I hope a stimulus package is introduced and it means business.
@Dearbhla O Reilly: you’re flirting with the doorman and you’re hoping that a stimulus package is introduced that means business. Hhmmm. That’s definitely living alright. :)
@GrumpyAulFella: nothing like a good stimulus package… ;-)
@Dearbhla O Reilly: :-)
@Dearbhla O Reilly: letting it all go died when everything started being filmed and photographed.
@Dearbhla O Reilly: I always thought a stimulus package arrived from an online shop in a plain brown box.
Another nice fat contract for seetec/jobs path,
Here we go again, kerching
The same old story as the last crisis.
Upskilling in “strategic planning ” ? A course provided by the government who have absolutely NO strategic planning in running this country.
And then again the events and experience industry is just forgotten… hospitality isn’t the only sector closed, events professionals have been impacted as much as the pubs.
@Kate Sheppard: indeed, and it will probably be the last to reopen – if ever.
Seems like the government is prettymuch prepared to kill this sector and expects people to need to find employment elsewhere.
@Ainm: I would entirely agree with you. Alcohol action Ireland seem to have some very powerful friends in Government. A traditional Irish pub is a thing of beauty. I don’t understand why it has been destroyed by people in power on 6 figure salaries
Phupp off you phupping pedro files
@David Jones: that’s it! I’m calling the man!
I see this as being a cynical move by our Gestapo government. They don’t want to pay the pup even though it is because of them that the industry has been destroyed. More disgusting actions from an unelected Government
The government as much as saying the hospitality sector is finished. The vultures are circling.
Online courses
Been there before with these courses ecdl course of landscape gardening or welding. Then when you complete a course and look for a compatible career you’re not qualified enough or there is so excuse why you can’t do the job.
have your say