COVID19: No deaths, cases rise, fewer patients

Cyprus reported no coronavirus deaths for the first time in three weeks on Monday, as new daily cases jumped back up beyond the 3,000 mark and rose to 3,782, with hospitalisations dropping to 101, of whom 14 are critical.

The Health Ministry said in its Covid bulletin that the death toll since the pandemic started remained unchanged at 902, with the March figure at 37.

January was the deadliest month on record with 101, followed by 91 in February, overtaking the previous record of 80 last August.

The number of patients being treated for Covid-19 dropped from 107 to 101, with critical cases also down from 17 to 14.

Intubated patients increased to six, while 57% of hospitalised COVID-19 patients were unvaccinated.

Some 22 patients are still considered post-Covid, having recovered from the virus, but remain intubated and in a serious state.

The total number of SARS-CoV-2 infections since March 2020 has risen to 356,784.

34,000 tests in schools

A total of 111,926 PCR and rapid tests were conducted during the past 24 hours, about 42,000 more than the previous day, of which 34,000 in schools.

Of the 19,501 tests in primary schools, 109 were positive, as were 81 from 10,362 tests in high schools. A further 61 infections were discovered from the “test to stay” programme for students and teachers.

With a rapid rise in the number of tests, as well as in new cases from 2,314 to 3,782, the benchmark ‘positivity rate’ dropped from 3.55% to 3.38%, more than triple the safe marker of 1%.

Having peaked at 5,457 on January 4, driven by a spike in the Omicron variant, new cases remained below 2,500 in recent weeks and dropped briefly to 1,500-1,700 the previous weekend.

Of the new infections, 113 were identified through contact tracing linked to earlier infections.

New infections in care homes increased to 33 from among 1,400 tests, while two tested positive from 1,733 tests in restricted institutions.