COVID19: New cases keep rising, no deaths

Cyprus reported no coronavirus deaths for the fourth day in a row on Tuesday and the twelfth this month, as the number of new daily cases continued to rise to 386, while hospitalisations remained at 88.

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

New daily infections increased to 386, up 32 from Monday, while hospitalisations were the same as the previous day’s 88, of whom 38 are serious, one less.

Intubated patients rose to 15 from 13, and 63% 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 128,424.

The number of PCR and antigen rapid tests conducted during the past 24 hours totalled 59,730, around 7,000 fewer than the previous day, with 16,500 tests in schools.

Of the 12,822 samples in high schools, 23 tested positive, and only one had the virus from 3,811 tests in primary schools.

With fewer tests and an increase in new cases, the benchmark ‘test positivity’ rate shot up to 0.65% from 0.53%, but within the high-risk threshold of 1%.

Of the new cases, 44 were identified through contact tracing linked to earlier infections and 90 were diagnosed from private initiative and hospital tests.

A further 144 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 1,078 tests at retirement homes were negative, as were 314 random rapid tests at airports, while one tested positive from among 165 samples in restricted institutions.