The Chief Medical Officer has said he is not concerned about the collapse of Ireland’s contact tracing system this week.
The HSE asked thousands of COVID-19 patients to do their own contact tracing after the system became overwhelmed last weekend.
A further 1,066 cases were confirmed last night, along with three more deaths.
People are now 100-times more likely to contract the virus in Ireland than they were in June.
The national 14-day incidence rate is now 302 cases per 100,000 people – up from just three per 100,000 in June.
National 14-day incidence rate rises above 300 pic.twitter.com/iwnHp7Lncw
— Ben Finnegan (@_BenFinnegan) October 22, 2020
Contact tracing
The Chief Medical Officer Dr Tony Holohan said the issues facing the contract tracing system do not change what we all need to do in order to slow the spread of the virus.
“The fact that our contact tracing system has had a challenge in identifying each individual close contact that arises from each individual case does not prevent you as an individual behaving responsibly and listening to what we are saying.
“We are saying act as though you are close contact and stay at home other than for essential purposes.”
He said we were never going to contact trace our way out of the pandemic and urged everyone to double down on public health guidelines to bring the virus under control.
“We can’t just keep expecting to continue to contact trace very large burdens of infection and think if we can contact trace all of that, we can in some way tolerate a very large burden of infection that is producing that amount of preventable hospitalisation,” he said.
“Our contact tracing system has been under pressure because of the exponential growth and what we now need to do is each of us, follow the public health advice.”
Local rates
Ballyjamesduff in County Cavan remains the local area with the highest 14-day incidence of Covid-19, with the rate more than doubling over the past week to 1,488.
Ratoath in County Meath now has a rate of 1,212 and has seen an increase of over 220% in the past week.
Other areas with high rates include Gorey in Wexford at 979, Galway City Central at 981 and Cork South Central at 804.
Ballyjamesduff, Cavan remains the LEA with the highest 14-day incidence rate at 1488.
Followed by Ratoath, Meath on 1212. Both reflected in the county incidence.
Other areas with high rates:
-Gorey, Wexford - 979
-Galway City Central - 981
-Cork South Central - 8041/2
— Ben Finnegan (@_BenFinnegan) October 22, 2020
The area with the highest rate in Dublin now is Palmerstown-Fonthill on 386.
A number of local electoral areas still have a rate of less than five - including Nenagh in county Tipperary and Lismore in Waterford.
With reporting from Ben Finnegan.
