Covid: 145 deaths due to outbreaks in nursing homes and hospitals since June

A total of 145 people have died as a result of Covid-19 outbreaks in nursing homes and community hospitals since the end of June, according to a new report.

There have been 155 outbreaks in these locations in the current wave, leading to 2,175 cases. These gave rise to 168 hospitalisations, of which 36 died, the latest update from the Health Protection Surveillance Centre, the HSE unit responsible for gathering data on Covid-19 cases in the State, shows.

Over the same period, 67 deaths have been linked to hospital outbreaks of Covid-19. There were 881 cases arising from hospital outbreaks since June 27th, of which 13 were admitted to ICU.

Six further deaths have been linked to outbreaks in other residential institutions, such as centres for disability or mental health facilities, over the period. A small number (less than five) of deaths occurred among Traveller and Roma populations and in prison.

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The number of Covid-19 outbreaks fell last week, but there were more cases in schools, residential institutions and workplaces, according to the report.

The number of school outbreaks increased to 24 (there were 14 new outbreaks in primary schools and 10 in secondary schools) from 16 the previous week, the highest weekly in the current wave, according to the latest update from the Health Protection Surveillance Centre.

There have been 1,792 linked cases reported in primary school outbreaks during the fourth week of the pandemic since June and 152 in secondary schools.

Seven primary school cases linked to outbreaks resulted in hospitalisation.

The Health Protection Surveillance Centre defines an outbreak as two more linked cases of the disease.

School outbreaks are associated with both school children and staff. The HPSC said that transmission “within the school has not necessarily been established in these outbreaks”.

Hospital outbreaks fell sharply from 27 to eight, most likely due to the administration of Covid-19 booster doses to staff. Nursing homes, where the provision of boosters to residents is almost complete, also saw clusters fall from nine to five.

However, there was a further increase in the number of outbreaks in residential institutions, from 21 to 24. This is the highest level for this location in the current wave.

Workplace outbreaks grew from six to 10 but family outbreaks in private houses fell from 29 to 15.

There were six new outbreaks in childcare facilities, down three on the previous week.

Amongst vulnerable populations, there were seven new outbreaks reported in the Traveller community with 28 new linked cases. This brings to 924 the number of cases among Travellers during the fourth wave of infections. There have been 26 hospitalisations among this group.

There were two new outbreaks in prisons with six new cases reported in the week, bringing to 66 the total number of outbreak-linked cases in prisons since the end of June.

Although the report does not state this, the notified figures may underestimate the number of outbreaks, because of the intense pressure on the testing and tracing system at present.