COVID19: One more death as cases rise

Another person died of coronavirus on Saturday, as the number of new cases rose 24% to 295, but hospitalisations were unchanged.

The Health Ministry said in its daily Covid bulletin that a 77-year-old man was the latest victim of the pandemic, raising the September death toll to 10 in four days.

To date, 513 people have died from the virus, of whom 332 were men (64%) and 181 women.

The average age is 76.4 years.

August was the worst month on record, with 80 deaths.

The previous record was shared in January and last December, with 76 deaths each.

The Health Ministry said that 133 patients are currently admitted to state hospitals for treatment, of whom 43 are in serious condition.

This is the same level reported the previous day.

Meanwhile, 18 patients remain intubated, two more than on Friday, while 84.22% of hospital patients are unvaccinated.

A further 16 patients are considered post-Covid, having recovered from the virus, but remain intubated and in a serious state.

The total number of all SARS-CoV-2 infections since the pandemic started in March 2020 was rose to 116,621.

Some 55,492 PCR and antigen rapid tests were conducted during the past 24 hours, 4,477 less than the day before.

With fewer tests and a higher number of 295 new infections, 57 more than the day before, the benchmark ‘test positivity’ improved and increased to 0.53% from the previous day’s 0.40% and below the high-risk threshold of 1%.

Of the new cases, 52 were from contact tracing, nine passengers tested positive in PCR tests at Larnaca and Paphos airports, and 79 were diagnosed from private initiative and hospital tests.

A further 104 cases were identified from private rapid tests at labs and pharmacies, and 51 were positive from the free national testing programme, available only to those vaccinated or recovered from earlier infections.

Of these, 24 were in Nicosia, 7 in Limassol, 5 in the Famagusta district, 9 in Larnaca and 2 in Paphos.