COVID19: Serbian footballer among three Cyprus cases

Cyprus is experiencing a steady drip of COVID-19 cases with health authorities confirming three more infections on Friday, including a Serbian footballer, taking the total to 1,013 since the outbreak.

The Health Ministry announced three new confirmed COVID-19 cases after conducting 1,247 tests.

One of the positive cases was an APOEL FC footballer who arrived on the island from Serbia three days ago and underwent a test at the Nicosia club’s initiative.

APOEL issued a statement confirming their player tested positive, without naming him.

The Ministry said the Serbian player was diagnosed positive more than two weeks ago and tested negative three times before boarding a plane to Cyprus.

The second case was a Polish permanent resident who had returned recently to Cyprus and underwent a test privately.

A total of 219 tests were carried out on private initiative.

A third infection involved a close contact of a case announced on 7 July involving an arrival from Israel.

The Ministry of Health said it had carried out 87 tests on contacts of known coronavirus cases.

According to epidemiological data, no positive cases were detected from 432 lab tests on employees who went back to work during phase two and three of easing restrictive measures, or 109 tests carried out by the Microbiological Labs of the general hospitals.

Also returned negative were 358 samples taken from passengers and repatriates and 42 tests completed as part of referrals from GPs and special groups screening at public health centres.

No patient was admitted to Famagusta General, the referral hospital for COVID-19, which saw its only patient discharged on Tuesday.

Turkish Cypriot health authorities reported another COVID-19 case on Thursday taking the total in the north to 115.

The case was traced after some 779 tests were carried out and involve a Turkish citizen who arrived in the north by sea.

Divided Cyprus has a combined total of 1,128 COVID-19 cases.