Another 23 lives have been lost to Covid-19 the Department of Health has said today, bringing the national death toll in the pandemic to 1,339.
Another 211 cases of Covid-19 have also been confirmed to the HPSC as of today, meaning that there are now 21,983 people who have been diagnosed in the Republic of Ireland.
Galway saw a minor increase in today’s figures with four more confirmed coronavirus cases, bringing the total in the county to 369.
Dr. Tony Holohan, Chief Medical Officer, Department of Health, said: “As Ireland works to ease restrictions, it is crucial that we preserve the progress our country has made in recent weeks.”
“This is a highly infectious disease. It thrives in crowds. It has the potential to rapidly spread to levels that our health service will find difficult to respond to.”
“While we plan how to safely emerge from recent restrictions, none of us should forget that the virus is still in our community.”
“Those who get infected have the same risk of serious illness as they did at the beginning of this pandemic.”
For people infected by the coronavirus, around 80% will develop a mild to moderate illness, 14% will have a severe Covid-19 case, and 6% will be critically ill.
Today saw the first change in lockdown restrictions in more than a month. While people are still expected to remain in their homes except for limited circumstances, there has been a mild loosening of the terms.
The travel limit has been lifted from 2km to 5km from today, and people over the age of 70 who are cocooning are being allowed to get a breath of fresh air again.
Older people are allowed out to exercise again, provided that they avoid contact with others.
As of midnight Monday, May 4, 214,761 tests have been carried out.
Over the past week, 61,707 tests were carried out and of these 2,280 were positive, giving a positivity rate of 3.7%.
Dr. Cillian De Gascun, Chair of the NPHET Expert Advisory Group, said; “The positivity rate reducing is a good sign.
“Combined with the high level of testing we are now undertaking, this gives us confidence that we are on a path towards suppression of the disease.”
