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LAST UPDATE | 26 Jan 2021
A FURTHER 928 new cases of Covid-19 have been confirmed in Ireland, the National Public Health Emergency Team (NPHET) has said this evening.
In a statement, it said that a further 90 people confirmed to have Covid-19 have died. NPHET said 89 of these deaths occurred in January.
These latest figures confirm that more than 3,000 people have died in Ireland with Covid-19 since the start of the pandemic.
The total number of cases now stands at 189,851, while the death toll is 3,066.
NPHET said this evening that six additional cases are linked to the South African variant of the virus.
As of 2pm today, 1,750 patients with Covid-19 were hospitalised. Of these, 216 are in ICU.
Within today’s new cases, half are in people under 45 years of age. 257 of the new cases are in Dublin, 115 in Cork, 71 in Louth, 53 in Galway, 45 in Limerick and the remaining 387 cases are spread across all other counties.
In a statement, chief medical officer Dr Tony Holohan said: “Today we are reporting a further 90 deaths, bringing our cumulative total of lives lost to Covid-19 to more than 3,000 in Ireland.
“This highly infectious disease is having a severe impact on the most vulnerable in our society and we must continue the good work we are doing to suppress it.
“The decline in daily incidence of Covid-19 has begun, however the volume of disease in our communities remains very high. To date we have reported 96,000 cases in January 2021, which has already passed the total of 93,500 cases reported in 2020. Indeed, public health doctors in the Midlands reported a total of 4,000 cases in the first 8 months of 2020 and another 4,000 cases in the first four weeks of 2021.
“Through our enhanced public health surveillance programme, we have identified 6 additional cases linked to the Southern African variant of concern. All cases are being followed up by public health teams in line with the latest ECDC guidance published on the 21st January.”
Deaths of people with Covid-19 are not reported in real time but may have occurred over a period of several days.
The number of deaths reported on a given day, therefore, does not necessarily mean that a person with Covid-19 died within the previous 24-hour period or even the preceding few days.
In the early days of the pandemic, Chief Medical Officer Dr Tony Holohan urged families, despite the difficulty, to register their loved ones deaths as early as possible so that health officials could gain an accurate picture of mortality.
Essentially, there is a delay between when a person dies from Covid-19 and the National Public Health Emergency Team being informed of their passing.
Earlier today, the government announced that the country will remain under the current Level 5 restrictions until 5 March at the earliest.
A further tightening of incoming travel was also confirmed, including mandatory 14-day quarantine in hotels for arrivals from ‘high-risk areas’ such as Brazil and South Africa and those without a negative PCR test.
The government also said that those entering the country from non ‘high-risk’ areas will be required to self-isolate at home by law for the first time.
With reporting from Cónal Thomas
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This reads like a press release.
Blackstone. That sounds familiar. Are they the same Blackstone who mercilessly hound people who get behind on the credit card payments? Perhaps after they spend too much in retail establishments?
@Neal Ireland Hello.: Athens end of the day if you can’t afford to pay it back, don’t get the credit card
110 shoplifting day till Christmas.
@Pat Troy: So you’re counting down the days until you can go shoplifting? Okaaaay.
I live right beside the center. It’s a bit Looney traffic wise on busy days alright but tons of parking etc. Great news that there may be up to 6000 jobs ! There is a new bridge approved and being built soon which will overhaul the traffic flows on the M3 approach so that’s a good thing for both local business and the center ! Welcome to B-Town !
Maybe they’ll finally put in a few toilets
@JohnBeeRyan: theres pretty large toilets on both levels in the main centre ? I presume you mean more toilets ?? , id prefer they spend a few quid on the approach roads entry / exit they are way too bottlenecked and coming and going can be a shambles if its at all busy.
@Dave Hammond: too bottlenecked? As in the is a such thing as a right amount of bottlenecked?
Awful news, this will be a serious threat to the smaller shopping centres in the region.
@alphanautica: hmm I fail to see how adding more retail and jobs to the general area is awful news , the centre attracts massive amount of people from many surrounding counties into the area , it is far better to see retail being expanded than migrating online which is a far bigger commercial threat to the other shopping centres you mention.
@alphanautica: its great news! Jobs will be created, there will be more choice for shoppers and the smaller centres will need to up their standards fo stay relevant.. long overdue! Roselawn Shopping Centre, for example, is atrocious!
@alphanautica: which shopping centres specifiically?
More traffic from lunatic shoppers as if it wasnt already bad enough…roll on next recession
This is not a good news story, yes the construction jobs is great of course but the retail jobs will just be taking from other locations be that locally or city centre. There is a finite amount of money to go around all these retail units. The planners need to look at this effect it happened in Naas they build a centre outside the town and the life is sucked out of the town itself now just lots of empty units.
There shouldn’t be any expansion allowed at blanch until the approach and exit ways from the town centre are updated and improved. Extra Parking needs to be looked at in a big way also. Every bank holiday weekend, christmas, new year sales, etc etc. Security staff block cars leaving giving priority to cars entering. In effect this means cars have to circle for half an hour or so to find a parking space. The whole surrounding area becomes one big parking lot. Nothing moves. I lived next door for 10 years so I know all about it. Only in Ireland would this be allowed. But Hey lets build more shops and outlets to satisfy some developers greed who also happens to give a few political donations. Don’t mind about the serfs. Don’t put in any pre-conditions that just might make things work better or might also affect their bottom line. We can’t have that. Politicians just make plenty of big empty promises come each election and once they’re in, they’re untouchable for 5 years and the pensions guaranteed, so business as usual. Meanwhile Leo employs a high profile PR firm to do the window dressing.
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