Cyprus reported five coronavirus deaths on Wednesday, three more than the day before, as well as a small drop in hospitalisations to 131 and new cases to 182, which helped lower the national infection rate to 0.37%.
The health ministry said in its daily Covid bulletin that four women, aged 72 to 95, and a 75 year old woman were the latest victim of the pandemic, raising the death toll for September to 20 and the to date figure to 523.
The number of patients currently admitted at state hospitals for treatment dropped by ten from Tuesday to 131, of whom 34 are in serious condition, five less than the previous day.
Meanwhile, 16 patients remain intubated, down by two, while 81% of hospital patients are unvaccinated.
A further 10 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 rose to 117,379.
Some 48,588 PCR and antigen rapid tests were conducted during the past 24 hours, 3,000 more than the day before, including about 11,000 tests on high school students who started their classes on Tuesday.
With an increase in number of tests and 182 new infections, 24 less than the day before, the benchmark ‘test positivity’ rate dropped to 0.37% from Tuesday’s 0.45% and below the high-risk threshold of 1%.
Of the new cases, 25 were identified through contact tracing linked to earlier infections, five passengers tested positive in PCR tests at Larnaca and Paphos airports, and 39 were diagnosed from private initiative and hospital tests.
A further 79 cases were identified from private rapid tests at labs and pharmacies, and 34 were positive from the free national testing programme, available only to those vaccinated or recovered from earlier infections.
All of the 787 staff and residents in retirement homes tested negative for Covid-19, as well as 37 tests of guests hosted by the Hotels Association, while 197 random rapid tests at the airports identified two new infections.
Of the 11,032 tests on gymnasium and lyceum students and staff, only three tested positive – one in Nicosia and two in Paphos.
Elementary students will go to school on Monday.
