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IT’S LOOKING UP.
A total of 1,492 new cases of Covid-19 were confirmed across Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday – compared to 1,586 new cases reported over the same period last week and 1,854 the previous week – marking a drop of 21% since Friday 2 April.
Ireland’s national incidence rate is 119 cases per 100,000 of the population on a 14-day rolling average, according to data from the Health Protection Surveillance Centre, compared to 147.3 this day last week and 164.9 on 2 April.
Looking at 14-day incidence rates in individual counties, Offaly remains the county with the highest incidence of Covid-19 in Ireland at 211.6 cases per 100,000.
Kildare is the second-highest county in Ireland with a 14-day incidence rate of 196.1 while Donegal is third-highest at 190.3
Looking at Local Electoral Area data, Tullamore, Co Offaly remains the area with the highest individual incidence of Covid-19 at 408.1 cases per 100,000.
For a breakdown of Covid-19 incidence rates in LEAs around Ireland, see here.
Counties with the current lowest incidence rates include Sligo (18.3), Kilkenny (24.2) and Clare (37).
There has not been a single case of Covid-19 reported in Sligo over the past 10 days.
Between 70% and 75% of cases this week were in people aged under 45.
It was expected that cases would continue to stall. But – as vaccination kicks in and people stick to mixing outdoors – incidence has continually decreased.
Looking to Europe, Ireland now has one of the lowest incidence rates among European countries, just slightly behind Finland (105.93) and Malta (140.51).
European countries with the highest rate of Covid-19 include Hungary (861), Poland (839) and France (762).
Deputy Chief Medical Officer Dr Ronan Glynn said on Thursday that Ireland “is in a far better position” but that “we do have a way to go” yet.
Hospital & ICU
Cases in hospital continue to decline.
There were 15 hospital admissions in the last 24 hours and 18 discharges up to Friday.
There were – as of Friday morning – 190 confirmed Covid-19 cases in hospital and 51 people in Intensive Care Units.
On Friday 20 March, there were 336 people hospitalised with Covid-19, reducing 226 on 9 April to 190 today.
Testing/Tracing/Outbreaks
Approximately 105,000 tests have been carried out over the past 7 days up to Friday – a reduction on 110,000 test average per week between 27 March and 9 April.
The positivity rate has reduced further to 2.8% having stood at 3% last week and 3.8% three weeks ago.
According to HSE figures released this week two Dublin walk-in test centres – Mulhuddart and Finglas had the highest positivity rate last weekend at just under 6%.
It is not surprising given the aim of these walk-in centres is to target areas of high incidence to reduce Community Transmission.
Considering Dublin’s high incidence rate – 608 out of the last 1,492 cases.
This week was the first since August 2020 with no new outbreaks in nursing homes, according to HPSC data.
Incidence in healthcare workers has also collapsed as vaccination takes effect – There has been a 98% decrease in this cohort since a peak in early January.
Deaths in those over 65 are declining each week – The number of deaths in this age group was less than 30 per week in late February and has declined further to 3 deaths this week.
Health officials expect to see a similar collapse in Covid-19 in people aged over 65 as Ireland’s vaccination programme is rolled out.
Finally, as of Tuesday, 1,121,003 vaccines had been administered in Ireland – 789,526 were first doses representing 20.2% of Ireland’s total population with 331,477 people now fully vaccinated against Covid-19.
***
The Journal each Friday takes a look at Ireland’s Covid-19 situation by examining and comparing data from previous weeks. If you’d like to get in touch with any queries related to these figures contact conal@thejournal.ie.
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So just open up the country now !! Enough is enough ,
Not far off herd immunity, more people had the virus without ever even knowing it … open it all up … live life again , take a chance , pretend it never happened
@Ríain HenC: You need to read up a bit more about herd immunity. We’ll likely never reach it
@Ríain HenC: ‘Pretend it never happened’ …. ? The fragile-minded have been blaming the virus for the mental and economic hardship that many have endured over the past year, when history will show that it was the farcical OTT rules all along ….
@Martin Galvin: can you show us what would have happened if no measures were taken? Hint: look at North and south dakota.
Oscail an pubs.
@John Sheahan: Ni ha
@John Sheahan: what are you on about, there are pubs out there that never closed.
I think if we are ahead of the curve let’s ensure we don’t regress back to the some of the worse EU country’s incident rates, but at the same let’s open up in a regulated way the retail shops and hairdressers etc NOW.. There is no reason why Covid regulated services like that are shut till the end of May. Pubs to follow shortly after.
@Brian O’Driscoll: because we are aiming to be the best in class of the EU for only opening via vaccinated numbers, plus we must be well close to the top in terms of debts at this stage, borrowed to fund covid. Even when pascal is telling us we could be a few years before the books are balanced on the countries finances, you still have people who are financially comfortable thinking nah best stay closed till we get every man, woman, child and their pets vaccinated and maybe sure clear the hse waiting lists as well while we are at it
@Tarraing Mo Liathróidí: Best in class, it is not a spelling test.
Best in class means less deaths, less long term ill.
The economic pain is being felt by every country so our lockdown is not going to make a massive difference to that in comparison to lesser lock downs.
The HSE we all know is broken and it has given us a chance to fix it.
The data at this stage could be presented on the back of a cornflakes box and it wouldn’t matter, we only open via vaccine numbers despite what Leo said back in January. I just hope the stubborn nature of NPHET to only let us off the level 4.9999999999 ball and chain by June or July, doesn’t backfire financially for businesses cos despite what Glynn and Co said the other day, that the pandemic is alone is keeping 600k people away from their jobs and businesses closed. Sorry Ronan maybe some people won’t blame ye if they lose their job or businesses, but a large portion will lay the blame solely at the church of NPHET door for this
@Tarraing Mo Liathróidí: Doesn’t work like that. NPHET can only advise, politicians make the decisions and take the responsibility.
The fact is that the government are under no pressure from any political parties in Leinster House to change tack. Nobody, SF, Labour, Soc Dems, PBP, is proposing opening up now and you have to wonder why.
@Tarraing Mo Liathróidí: The advice given by Nphet has saved thousands of lives and saved even more from long covid issues.
Look at the other countries who did the opposite. All countries have suffered both financially and physically.
The entire world has a rebuilding job to do.
So lets do it right, not rushing to open only to lockdown again like Chile and others have had to do.
When blaming Nphet which you constantly do, you are wrong and need to understand how things work.
Same old same old
Imagine doing something straight away. Still a year too late. Ingenious.
The numbers are moving in the right direction and there will be ups and downs.
the possible change to age related vaccinations is interesting as it is a balancing act between vulnerable people and super spreaders.
They have made few rash decisions on changing policy, when they did it blew up in our faces. Christmas being the perfect example.
Focused vaccinations is a way to stop the spread once the most vulnerable have been vaccinated.
Makes sense really.
have your say