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Easter camps for children have been blacklisted by public health officials amid concerns that game dates, St. Patrick’s Day parties and Mother’s Day celebrations have been fueling the spread of the Covid-19.
This occurs when the Covid-19 spread remains volatile and the overall situation is “high risk.”
“Going between the game dates, the St. Patrick’s Day parties, the Mother’s Day parties, where more and more people are gathering … they are not appreciating the risk of further transmission,” said Dr. Miriam Owens , HSE Public Health Specialist. “Children reflect what is in the community. What seems to be happening in the community is that people are getting tired and feel like it’s time to relax. But this is not the time to relax. “
Dr. Owens spoke at last night’s Covid-19 briefing, where Professor Philip Nolan, who tracks the virus, revealed that there was a four- to six-fold increase in children under the age of 12 referred by GPs for the proof.
There has been a 40-50 percent increase in cases in young children since February, but he said only a fraction were linked to schools.
“I know it is somewhat controversial for me to say it, but just because things are happening at the same time, because they are happening at the same time, does not imply a direct cause and effect relationship.”
When asked about the children’s Easter camp announcements, Deputy Chief Medical Officer Dr. Ronan Glynn said he would appeal to the organizers not to hold them back and to parents not to involve their children.
Earlier, Professor Nolan warned that the current spread of the virus was static or “potentially disproved.”
The situation remains volatile and “high risk,” he added.
Three more deaths and 606 new cases were reported yesterday. The National Public Health Emergency Team (Nphet) meets on Monday to make recommendations to the government for reopening on April 5, but signs last night indicated that they will remain cautious.
The message was that it takes another two months and significant implementation of the Covid-19 vaccine before there is room for a significant reduction in restrictions.
Dr. Glynn again held out hope for what vaccination can bring with the promise of a return to a normal lifestyle that has not been experienced since 2019.
However, the difficulty in getting people to “stick” is seen in a new ESRI survey showing that in January one in 20 people had been visiting other people’s homes.
But in the week ending March 14, this increased to one in 10.
He said that while it showed that the “vast majority” of people followed public health advice, it did represent a significant change. Dr. Owens said that public health physicians were finding cases where people came together to play cards.
Parents were gathering outside the school gates and daycare centers more than they had ever been.
Going back to school also means parents were able to meet up with others during the day, he added.
The reopening of classes also led to a sign that more people were returning to the workplace.
When asked to comment on previous comments by Tánaiste Leo Varadkar that reducing the number of daily cases is not a possibility due to the infectious UK variant, Professor Nolan said that while it was difficult to see, “we have shown that we can do this. “
“We did better three or four weeks ago when we managed to keep our contacts a little bit lower,” he said.
Yesterday there were 312 people with Covid-19 in the hospital, including 75 in intensive care.
The number of intensive care admissions is slowly decreasing.
Professor Nolan said he was looking for hospitals where there were a constant 20 to 25 admissions per day.
This is an indicator of the level of disease in the population apart from the tests.
“For me, this is the strongest indicator that we are in a static or disapproving situation.”
The HSE is concerned that an increase in cases will lead to another increase in admissions.
The death gauge leveled off again after falling, with around 50 to 60 deaths a week. There has been a slight increase in deaths in the community. The good news is that there has been a “near disappearance” of the virus in residential settings and this must be related to the vaccine.
Meanwhile, Dr. Lorraine Nolan of the Health Products Regulatory Authority (HPRA) said 5,500 reports of suspected side effects from Covid-19 vaccines had been reported.
She said most were temporary and expected. “We have three safe and effective vaccines, AstraZeneca, Pfizer and Moderna, and will shortly be adding the Johnson & Johnson vaccine to increase the deployment of protection against this highly communicable disease.”
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