COVID19: Cyprus cases stay in double figures

Cypriot health authorities reported 11 new Covid-19 infections on Friday, one up from the previous day, but down from the 26-case surge in mid-week with tests remaining relatively high.

The 11 infections were diagnosed after 3,201 tests, bringing the total number of Covid-19 cases to 1,406 since March.

Among the new cases, five had a recent travel history with two of them involving Cypriots returning from holiday at the Greek islands of Mykonos and Corfu.

The third case with recent travel history, according to the Health Ministry involves a foreign national, who had arrived from Budapest positive after being tested upon her arrival to the island.

All three cases arrived in Cyprus on Thursday.

A fourth case was a woman with a travel history but was not traced upon her arrival.

She was tracked through the tracing of close contacts, as her husband, who was travelling with her was found positive on 19 August when they had returned from a trip to Slovenia and Serbia.

The fifth travel case was a Cypriot who had returned from Thessalonica on Tuesday and was sent to be tested by his General Practitioner after developing symptoms.

A total of 1,178 tests were carried out on arrivals at the country’s airports.

Another four people were registered as close contacts of known cases, they were family members of three already known cases.

Some 140 tests were carried out on contacts of known coronavirus cases.

Another case involved a person who took the test at a private lab after developing symptoms.

The last case was detected after being tested at Larnaca General Hospital microbiological lab.

The patient had visited the hospital’s Emergency Department with trouble breathing on Wednesday. He was later taken to the Famagusta General, the COVID-19 referral hospital.

The Health Ministry said that it had carried out some 885 tests within the framework of 10,000 random tests islandwide.

According to the Health Ministry, two patients are being treated at the COVID-19 referral hospital while one person is on a ventilator at Nicosia General’s Intensive Care Unit.