COVID19: One in 10 Cypriots self-isolating

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One-tenth of Cyprus’ one million population is in self-isolation due to contracting COVID-19 or declared a close contact of a known case, as Omicron ravages the island.

An unprecedented surge of COVID-19 cases, powered by the Omicron variant, has seen over 100,000 people go into isolation.

Health Ministry data shows that 28,000 people have tested positive for the virus in the past 10 days.

More than 5,000 new daily cases were reported on two occasions inside a week.

According to the head of the Health Ministry’s track and trace team, Valentinos Silvestros, each case detected reports a minimum of 3 close contacts who need to self-isolate.

In comments to Cyprus media, Silvestros said the team is not in a position to know how many of the contacts have been vaccinated against COVID-19.

“What we do know is that the majority of cases are between 20 and 30 years old.

“This age group is known to have the largest number of contacts.”

The head of the team tracking and tracing contacts of positive cases said the task has become more complicated with the recent surge in cases.

On a more worrying note, Silvestros said that 3,000 confirmed cases have not replied to the team’s calls, nor have they reported any close contacts.

To relieve the team from the increased pressure, the Health Ministry said people who test positive for coronavirus are now obliged to fill an online form to assist the contact tracing unit.

People who test positive receive a text message the next day, including a link with access codes to a portal where they can confirm their data and declare their contacts for tracing purposes.

The form can be found at https://phase.ucy.ac.cy/ using access codes included in the text message sent by authorities, which are valid for 48 hours from when the message is received.