COVID19: No deaths as cases drop closer to 200

Cyprus reported no coronavirus deaths for the second day in a row on Sunday and the tenth this month, as the number of new daily cases dropped to 206 while hospitalisations increased to 85.

The Health Ministry said in its daily Covid bulletin that the death toll since the pandemic started stayed at 588.

New daily infections dropped to 206, down by 12 from Saturday, while hospitalisations increased by three to 85, of whom 39 are serious, seven more than the previous day.

Intubated patients rose to 11 from ten, and 65% of all hospital patients were reported as unvaccinated.

Three 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 127,684.

The number of PCR and antigen rapid tests conducted during the past 24 hours totalled 40,298, around 8,000 fewer than the previous day.

With fewer tests and new cases, the benchmark ‘test positivity’ rate increased to 0.51% from 0.45%, but within the high-risk threshold of 1%.

Of the new cases, six were identified through contact tracing linked to earlier infections, two tested positive from tests at Larnaca and Paphos airports and 24 were diagnosed from private initiative and hospital tests.

A further 66 cases were identified from private rapid tests at labs and pharmacies, and 108 were positive from the free national testing programme, available only to those vaccinated or recovered from earlier infections.

All of the 80 tests at retirement homes were negative, as were all 2,305 samples taken from restricted institutions.