THE CHIEF MEDICAL Officer at the Department of Health has indicated that measures aimed at combating the spread of Covid-19 will remain in place beyond this week.  

Dr Tony Holohan told reporters this evening that although officials at the department would continue to assess the impact of the measures, which have been in place since 27 March, it was “not likely” that he will recommend them to be lifted after Sunday.

“At this moment in time, we’re not anticipating a recommendation later in the week that we should lift the measures that are in place,” he said.

“We will give further assessment to that as the week goes on. We do want to see what I would describe as the full benefit of the measures that were put in place… 

“We think that as we get closer to the end of the week, we will be a much better place to make that formal assessment ahead of [12 April], but at this moment in time it doesn’t look likely that we’re going to be recommending a lifting of those restrictions.”

Under the measures, people are only allowed to leave their home for essential work, to buy food, attend medical appointments, vital family reasons or to take exercise within 2km of their home. They were initially expected to be in place until Easter Sunday.

Holohan’s comments were made during a briefing in which it emerged that 36 more people in Ireland had died from the coronavirus – the highest daily number since the beginning of the pandemic.

The number of confirmed cases of the virus in Ireland now stands at 5,709.

It also came as the World Health Organisation urged countries across the globe not to be too hasty about lifting restrictions, because doing so could lead to a resurgence in the number of cases.

This view was echoed by Professor Sam McConkey, the head of the Department of International Health and Tropical Medicine at the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland.

Speaking on Drivetime on RTÉ Radio 1 this evening, McConkey said that further restrictions over the next number of weeks would help to bring down the number of community transmissions of the virus and prevent further outbreaks.

“I think adding more restrictions for a week or two to really bring down transmissions might shorten the time that we have this plague among us, that our economy has stopped,” he said.

“By really going hell for leather and doing all we can do for the next week or two and getting the numbers down so there is no more community transmission of Covid-19.  

“We need to get unexplained community transmissions down almost to nothing before we relax and start doing everything that we’d like to do again.”