COVID19: Health Minister urges discipline to prevent surge

Cyprus Health Minister Constantinos Ioannou has urged the public to show discipline and resolve as they are the best weapons to prevent a national surge of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Following the peak of the pandemic in April, he noted, Cyprus managed to emerge with the least possible losses by demonstrating great persistence and patience.

“Today the epidemiological picture presents positive elements despite surges of cases at times,” Ioannou told an online conference on public health.

He said complacency was the enemy in the battle against COVID-19 and stressed the importance of society “engaging in this great fight.”

“The discipline we have shown as a people and the responsibility in implementing measures and protocols are the weapons at our disposal right now to prevent a great surge of cases which could likely have uncontrollable consequences.”

Cyprus saw a surge of 30 new cases on Tuesday, one of the highest jumps since the outbreak while there are more COVID patients being treated in hospital for months.

Addressing the conference European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC) official Dr Agoritsa Baka said in contrast with March and April, Cyprus now has people infected belonging to a younger age group (20-40).

Georgios Nikolopoulos, visiting assistant professor at the University of Cyprus Medical School, said Cyprus probably conducts the most daily tests (about 2,000-3,000) in the world according to its population.

Fofi Constantinidou, a psychology professor at the University of Cyprus presented a survey conducted during lockdown indicating that one in four adults, approximately 23%, had high levels of stress compared to other times when the percentage ranged between 1-4%.

At the same time, 67% of people who took part in the survey said that their quality of life changed a lot during the lockdown. (source CNA)