COVID19: No deaths as cases drop to 100

Cyprus reported no coronavirus deaths for the first time in 18 days, with new cases dropping to 100, while hospitalisations rose slightly to 112, keeping the transmission rate relatively low.

The health ministry said in its daily Covid bulletin that there were no deaths directly attributed to Covid-19 during the past 24 hours, with zero deaths last reported on August 16 and August 25.

This kept the monthly death toll for September at 25 and at 528 since the pandemic started.

The number of patients currently admitted at state hospitals for treatment rose slightly to 112 from Saturday’s 106, of whom 45 are in serious condition, two more than the previous day.

Meanwhile, 20 patients remain intubated, four more from the day before, while 84% of hospital patients are unvaccinated.

Another 12 patients are 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 the pandemic started in March 2020 rose to 117,931.

Some 43,478 PCR and antigen rapid tests were conducted during the past 24 hours, around 27,000 less than the day before.

With a relatively high number of tests and 100 new infections, 36 less than the day before, the benchmark ‘test positivity’ rate rose slightly to 0.25% from 0.19% and well below the high-risk threshold of 1%.

Of the new cases, one was identified from contact tracing, linked to earlier infections, seven were passengers tested positive in PCR tests at Larnaca and Paphos airports, and 20 were diagnosed from private initiative and hospital tests.

A further 28 cases were identified from private rapid tests at labs and pharmacies and 44 were positive from the free national testing programme, available only to those vaccinated or recovered from earlier infections.

Six of the 124 samples taken from staff and residents at retirement homes tested positive, as did two passengers from among 141 random tests at airports.