Cyprus could announce stricter measures early in the week to combat the spread of the Covid-19 pandemic after health officials announced 197 new cases of SARS-CoV-2 on Sunday, the second highest figure to date.
Health Minister Constantinos Ioannou is scheduled to meet his COVID scientific team on Monday where imposing stricter measures will be discussed to stem the high tide of cases.
The minister will later brief the cabinet on what the new data is indicating.
Sunday’s new cases, resulting from 3,053 targeted and random tests, brought the total of all infections since the pandemic started to 4,563, with nearly two thirds recorded in October alone.
The health ministry said that 81 new cases were identified through contact tracing, with the transmission rate being mainly local, as in the last 24 hours only 16 coronavirus cases were discovered among passengers arriving at Larnaca and Paphos airports.
Saturday also saw Britons returning home in panic and paying as much as €600 in penalties to change their tickets after the Boris Johnson’s administration removed Cyprus from a safe travel list on Thursday. This meant that all arrivals in the UK as of Sunday would be forced into a 14-day quarantine, regardless if they are positive with the coronavirus or not.
British holidaymakers cut short their holidays, while parents of school and university students got on the next available flight to avoid the self-isolation orders back home.
As was the case in early September when clusters started to form in specific areas in Limassol and created a chain among several football clubs in Larnaca district, Sunday’s new cases also included eight new cases of Covid-19 in the rural community of Kyperounda, where the authorities conducted 250 tests. On Saturday, 19 positive cases were reported in Kyperounda and 13 in Polis Chrysochous, Paphos district.
Some 39 patients are currently being treated in state hospitals, increasing the strain on the public health system, with the health ministry announcing a few days ago that the COVID reference Famagusta General hospital would extend its coronavirus ward by taking over beds and facilities from other sectors, such as the pathological ward. As a result, patients with non-virus conditions were spread out to other hospitals, including private ones.
An elderly woman died on Saturday, raising the death toll from being infected with SARS-CoV-2 virus to 33, while those who died as a direct cause of COVID-19 has risen to 26 since the outbreak in March.
The Health Ministry announced the death of a 91-year-old female patient treated at COVID referral hospital Famagusta General.
The average age of those who have died from COVID is 73 – the majority were men (17) and nine were women.
