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A total of 3,394 more people have tested positive for coronavirus in Ireland, while four more deaths have been confirmed.
It brings the number of infections here to 96,926 since the pandemic began.
The latest figures were announced by the Health Department tonight.
Cork was the worst affected region in the country, with 389 new cases, followed by Dublin with 355.
Donegal also reported 339, while Louth had 258 and May 233.
Medical Director Dr. Tony Holohan issued an urgent warning when he said that we could now be seeing a greater spread than at any point in the pandemic so far.
He said: “The incidence of COVID-19 is just as high, if not higher now than it was in March. Each individual needs to act like they are contagious. Hospitalizations are increasing to levels close to what we saw in the spring. Everyone needs to stay home, except for essential jobs or care.
(Image: Colin Keegan, Collins Dublin)
“It is really important that the elderly and vulnerable do not leave their homes unless absolutely necessary. This includes asking neighbors or family members to run errands like grocery shopping, limiting all contacts to only those people you live with or have to visit for essential care reasons.
“We need to rediscover the spirit of solidarity and community that we saw in March and April so that we can all do our part in protecting the elderly and vulnerable.
“People particularly vulnerable to COVID-19 include the elderly and people with pre-existing medical conditions including cardiovascular disease, obesity, diabetes, chronic respiratory diseases and cancer.”
It comes after a public health expert said that a new, more contagious strain of Covid-19 is probably not the reason why cases continue to rise across Ireland.
Today it has been confirmed that in the Republic of Ireland nine more cases of the new strain of Covid-19 discovered for the first time in Great Britain have been detected.
But Dr Cillian De Gascun, director of UCD’s National Virus Reference Laboratory, has said the data suggests the UK variant was not responsible for the recent “significant and worrying” increase in the number of coronavirus cases here. .
Dr De Gascun wrote on Twitter that further testing this week of Covid samples dating from December 23-29 has detected 9 additional UK variant cases in Ireland.
He added that this brings the total number of cases identified to 16 of the 169 analyzed to date.
“As a random, albeit small, selection of cases primarily from the community, these data would suggest that the UK variant of SARSCoV2, at a ratio of <10%, is not responsible for the recent significant and worrying increase in the number of cases of SARSCoV2 ".
It comes as experts continue to express concern about the pressure facing the public health system as the Covid-19 situation deteriorates.
This week Professor Philip Nolan, Chairman of NPHET’s Irish Epidemiological Modeling Advisory Group, gave an insight into the shocking delay Ireland’s testing system is currently experiencing after revealing that more than 9,000 new ones were expected to be confirmed. Covid cases in the coming days.
On Saturday, HSE CEO Paul Reid said 581 patients were in the hospital with Covid-19, an increase from 51 at 8 p.m. Friday night.
Meanwhile, there were 50 people in ICU.
He wrote on Twitter: “We probably haven’t seen the worst impacts yet. But everything we do today to stop the spread of this virus makes a big difference. Please do our part to protect our health service.”
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