Cyprus reported two coronavirus deaths on Monday, as new cases rose again to 166 having dipped below 100 the previous day, while hospitalisation rates increased slightly to 57.
Two men, aged 56 and 75, were the latest victims of the virus, raising the death toll since the pandemic started to 564, and October deaths to 12.
The Health Ministry said in its daily Covid bulletin that new daily cases rose again to 166, having dipped to 99 on Sunday, while the number of patients admitted at state hospitals for treatment increased by two to 57. Of these, 23 remain in serious condition, two more than the previous day.
Meanwhile, ten patients remain intubated, and 60% of hospital patients are reported as unvaccinated.
Another eight 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 122,528.
15,000 tests in schools
The number of PCR and antigen rapid tests conducted during the past 24 hours dropped to 66,954, some 28,000 more than Sunday.
Of these, 12,155 were tests in high schools, of whom six tested positive, while all of the 3,070 tests in primary schools had negative results.
With an almost double the number of tests and an increase in new infections to 166, about 67 more than the day before, the benchmark ‘test positivity’ dropped marginally to 0.25% from Sunday’s 0.26%, well within the high-risk threshold of 1%.
Of the new cases, 25 were identified through contact tracing linked to earlier infections, eight testing on passengers arriving at Larnaca and Paphos airports, and 20 were diagnosed from private initiative and hospital tests.
A further 82 cases were identified from private rapid tests at labs and pharmacies, and 31 were positive from the free national testing programme, available only to those vaccinated or recovered from earlier infections.
All 1,041 samples at retirement homes tested negative, as did 772 in special schools and 129 random rapid tests of airport arrivals.
One was positive among 213 tests in restricted institutions and one tested positive among 36 guests staying at hotels.
