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Dr Tony Holohan has asked people to stay home to try to wipe out the now out of control level five coronavirus in Ireland.
The medical director said they are not now testing close contacts as this is a “control” action, but Ireland is now in the “mitigation phase”.
The country’s top doctor said the spread of the disease is rapid in the community and everyone is being asked to help stop its growth.
The CMO tweeted this morning: “We have very high levels of community transmission of Covid-19.
“We find, test and track to isolate cases / restrict contacts like CONTAINMENT or ‘control’ actions. With the disease now out of control, we focus our public health actions on MITIGATION.
“Mitigation means that: 1. We focus testing on symptomatic. 2. Ask people with symptoms, who are waiting for a test / result or positive test to self-isolate for 10 days. 3. Track close contacts 4 Advise close contacts to restrict movement for 14 days 5. Have everyone else stay home to finish level 5.
Another 1,620 new cases were confirmed on Thursday, and experts warned of far worse numbers to come.
At a news conference, Professor Philip Nolan, chair of NPHET’s Irish Epidemiological Modeling Advisory Group, said that in recent days very few people had come forward for testing.
And Professor Nolan revealed that there are some 4,000 tests in the system that have yet to be confirmed as positive cases.
Speaking on Thursday, he said they estimate there are “somewhere in the region of 4,000 positive tests” reported in the last 2-3 days that have yet to be formally confirmed as cases.
“Simply put, this system was not designed to report 2/3 / 4,000 tests per day, and it will take several days to confirm all of those cases.”
Professor Nolan also cautioned that NPHET expected “a significant additional increase in cases and hospitalizations in the coming days before public health measures take effect and there are likely more than 700-1000 people in the hospital with COVID-19. early in the new year. “
He said: “The epidemiological situation is very serious and the virus is spreading rapidly among all age groups, increasing the risk for those most vulnerable to serious infection, such as the medically vulnerable and people over 60 years old.”
“The breeding number is at least 1.6-1.8. The daily growth rate is now estimated at 7-10%, giving a doubling time of 7-10 days or less.”
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