There was an increase of another 9 cases of COVID-19 in Tipperary yesterday.
Last night’s figures revealed 127 more people had been diagnosed with the virus and of all the counties with cases, Tipperary had the third highest increase, behind Dublin and Monaghan.
The Premier County has also had the third highest number of cases in the last two weeks.
Acting Chief Medical Officer, Ronan Glynn, says the recent spike in cases nationally is extremely concerning:
“Every county bar Leitrim has had at least one case over the past fortnight, with Dublin having 600, Kildare with 312, Tipperary with 142, Limerick with 81, Carlow and Cork with 42 each, Meath with 41 and Wexford with 39.
“Over the past five days, we’ve reported an average of 120 new cases per day.”
Infectious diseases expert, Professor Sam McConkey, says the outbreaks of Covid-19 in households are more concerning than those in meat factories.
There have been 26 clusters in meat processing plants including in Tipperary, and nearly 450 cases since the start of August.
There are also 252 active outbreaks related to social gatherings in private households.
Professor McConkey, from the RCSI, says that’s the bigger concern at the moment:
“The number of outbreaks in private households has been increasing dramatically recently, whereas the meat factories – while there’s still some happening – are getting fewer.
“The move to private households is much more challenging to deal with because they’re private spaces that are not regulated very much.
“Whereas organised workplaces, the employers and the people running that have a very strong interest in having their business up and working and working well and their employees healthy.”
