Cyprus reported no deaths attributed to Covid-19 on Tuesday, as new infections climbed to 181 and hospitalisations rose to 61.
The ministry said in its daily Covid bulletin that the death toll since the pandemic started remained unchanged at 564, of whom 12 died in October.
After a record 80 deaths in August, the number dropped to 40 in September, with ten days of no Covid-related deaths. So far, October has seen nine days of no Covid-related deaths in Cyprus.
New daily cases continued to rise to 181, from 166 on Monday, while the number of patients admitted at state hospitals for treatment increased by four to 61. Of these, 22 remain in serious condition, one less than the previous day.
Meanwhile, 11 patients remain intubated, and 61% of hospital patients are reported as unvaccinated.
Another seven patients are still 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 March 2020 rose to 122,709.
The number of PCR and antigen rapid tests conducted during the past 24 hours dropped to 52,794, some 14,000 less than Monday.
Ten cases in schools
Of these, 12,387 were tests in high schools, of whom five tested positive, and 3,466 in primary schools of whom five were positive.
With a lower number of tests and an increase in new infections to 181, 15 more than the day before, the benchmark ‘test positivity’ rose to 0.34% from Monday’s 0.25%, well within the high-risk threshold of 1%.
Of the new cases, 24 were identified through contact tracing linked to earlier infections, ten testing on passengers arriving at Larnaca and Paphos airports, and 43 were diagnosed from private initiative and hospital tests.
A further 70 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.
Only one of the 1,088 samples at retirement homes tested positive, as did one of 188 tests at restricted institutions.
All 17 tests at special schools and 53 random rapid tests of airport arrivals tested positive.
