Ireland

Coronavirus: Concern at rise in figures as 429 new cases reported

Northern Ireland sees 13 coronavirus deaths reported in over weekend

Christmas shoppers on Dublin’s Grafton Street last week. People have been advised to reduce social contacts and our activities over Christmas. File photo: Gareth Chaney/Collins

Sun Dec 13 2020 - 17:30

A further one death and 429 new cases of coronavirus have been reported by Department of Health on Sunday.

There has now been a total of 76,185 confirmed cases of the virus and 2,124 deaths since the start of the pandemic.

Of the cases notified today 198 are men and 230 are women, 66 per cent are under 45 years of age while the the median age is 34 years old.

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A total of 122 were reported in Dublin, 46 in Donegal, 30 in Limerick, 22 in Laois, 20 in Cork and the remaining 189 cases are spread across all other counties.

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As of 2pm today 193 Covid-19 patients are hospitalised, of which 31 are in ICU, with 13 additional hospitalisations in the past 24 hours.

Chief Medical Officer Dr Tony Holohan said he was “concerned that we are seeing the incidence of Covid-19 rising again.”

He said 429 was “ a large number of cases by the standard of recent weeks and the five day moving average has now increased above 300 per day.

Chief Medical Officer Dr Tony Holohan: “Our younger generation led the way, with the incidence in the 19-24 year age group reduced from 432 per 100,000 population to 41 per 100,000 population.” Photograph: Colin Keegan/Collins Dublin

“Our efforts in Level 5 in recent weeks brought the 14-day incidence rate down to 78 per 100,000 population, put us in a position of having the lowest disease incidence in Europe and ultimately protected many people and saved many lives.

“Take today’s figures as a sign that we all must now reduce our social contacts, limit our interactions with those outside our households, weigh the risks of what socialising we are planning over the next two weeks, so that we can all have as safe a Christmas as possible.”

The North's Department of Health reported that there were 13 more Covid-19 deaths over Saturday and Sunday taking the toll since the start of the pandemic in Northern Ireland to 1,124.

There were nine deaths recorded on Saturday and four on Sunday. There were 60 deaths reported in the past seven days, which is just two fewer than the 62 in the previous week.

There were 476 new coronavirus cases reported on Saturday and 483 on Sunday bringing the total of cases to 58,216.

Hospital bed occupancy is at 98 per cent in Northern Ireland. There are 407 patients receiving Covid-19 treatment in Northern Ireland hospitals with 29 in intensive care and 24 on ventilators.

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