The Health Minister says he did not leak the information about NPHET asking for Level Five restrictions to be introduced.
Stephen Donnelly was questioned in the Dáil last night, after it emerged he knew NPHET were considering upping restrictions long before some of his government colleagues.
The Minister informed the Taoiseach of a potential move to level four before NPHET met on Sunday.
But Stephen Donnelly insists no one had mentioned the possibility of Level Five saying “Was it a surprise to me, the Level Five recommendation on Sunday evening? It was, it was a surprise right, and for the various reasons I’ve outlined in the speech we chose to go with Level Three, but you’re asking was I surprised, were my cabinet colleagues surprised at a Level Five recommendation? Yes, we were”.
Rising ICU Admissions …
NPHET says the number of Covid-19 patients in hospital is growing ‘exponentially’.
The chairman of its modelling group says an average of 13 patients are being admitted every day.
Professor Philip Nolan says ICU admissions are also rising rapidly. There were 27 confirmed cases in intensive care last night with a further ten patients are suspected of having the disease.
179 people are being treated for Covid-19 in Irish hospitals – a jump of 20 from yesterday, making it the highest number of patients with the disease since 2nd June.
The total number of cases reached 40,000 last night, after 506 new infections were confirmed. To date Kilkenny has had 495 positive tests with 302 in Carlow.
UCC virus expert, Professor Gerry Killeen, says more restrictions will be needed to stop the recent trend noting “If the trajectory stays as it is, you know, there’s no reason why it wouldn’t be a thousand cases a day by the end of the month and there’s no reason that it you know, it wouldn’t keep going up ten thousand cases a day, those things can happen if you let them happen, sooner or later we’re going to have to run up through those extra gears that have been built into our Covid management car and we’re gonna have to drive it fast & hard to really take it on a downward trajectory”.
GP Buddy …
Covid-19 presentations to GPs have levelled off in Dublin, but are increasing in the rest of the country.
The new data comes from GP Buddy, which tracks the number of coronavirus patients going to doctors’ surgeries.
Dr Shane McKeogh is a founder of the group and says “Over the last two to three weeks there’s been a slight leveling of the trajectory in Dublin of presentations to GPs hopefully showing some effect of the Level Three restrictions and over the same time period there’s been an increase in the rest of the country”.
Worst to Come?
It comes as 69% of Irish people think the worst of the Covid-19 pandemic is yet to come.
An Irish Times Ipsos MRBI poll also shows that less than half of voters in the study believe the current level of restrictions is correct to deal with the crisis.
Meanwhile 56 believe the current Government is doing a good job in handling the pandemic.
Elsewhere …
The number of Covid-19 cases reported globally has hit a daily record.
The World Health Organisation says there have been a further 338,779 infections.
Belgium has one of the worst rates in Europe, with its average daily total increasing for seven days straight.
Nottingham now has the highest weekly rate of new coronavirus cases in England.
Latest figures show for every 100,000 people in the city, 689 of them have Covid-19 – that compares to 112 the previous week.
The UK has recorded another 17,500 cases in the last 24 hours, which is over 3,000 more than yesterday.
And from today, all pubs and restaurants across Scotland will shut indoors at 6pm and be barred from selling alcohol inside.
The first minister there announced the changes earlier this week after revealing the rate of infection for Covid-19 in the nation could be as high as one-point-six.
Nicola Sturgeon’s outlined five areas are getting even stricter restrictions and says “In these areas, all licensed premises with the exception of hotels for residents will be required to close indoors & outdoors but takeaways will be permitted, cafes which don’t have an alcohol license will be able to stay open until 6pm to support social isolation”.
