A DCU Professor of Immunology has said Ireland is entering a summer wave of Covid-19 as cases soar in the community.
According to the latest figures, there were 537 Covid patients in hospitals nationwide this morning, which marks an increase of 22 on yesterday’s numbers.
Of this number, 27 people are in intensive care units with the worst effects of the virus, but this marks a decrease of one on Friday’s numbers.
Speaking to RTE's Brendan O’Connor, Professor Christine Loscher said there may be as many as 10,000 daily cases at the moment.
“We have just seen what Portugal has been through,” she said.
“They have had an uptake in cases, but they seem to be on the decline now. It was a relatively short three- or four-week period where BA.5 took off and because it is more transmissible, they had more cases.
“We're not really going to know how many cases we have because we have quite restrictive PCR testing at the moment.
“We are doing about 5,000 tests a day, which is nowhere near what we were doing at the height of the pandemic.”
Professor Loscher suggested that the only way to keep on top of the current wave of the virus is to continue adhering to the public health advice and for those who are eligible for boosters vaccines to apply for them.
“We already know what those tools are,” she said.
“Be aware of the environment you are in. And if you do think it is a riskier environment it would be a good idea to put a mask back on.
"There is nothing we can do to prevent us from getting it but there are things you can do to minimise your risk.
“Mask wearing is one of them. It is not complete prevention, but it is a very good tool. I travelled recently and I was one of four people on the plane wearing a mask.”
Despite this, in a letter to Minister Stephen Donnelly, Dr. Tony Holohan quashed any rumours of new restrictions coming in by saying: "I have no advice nor have there been any questions raised in the Department of Health at this point around additional restrictions."
Meanwhile, Professor Luke O'Neill said that initial results show the new Omicron-specific vaccine to be "really effective."
Speaking today he said: "They got a very high antibody response. It was a hugely effective vaccine in the trial of course, this is the first trial of this.
“So now we have the first the Omicron-specific vaccine. The prediction will be that this will now become the one to use, obviously, because Omicron is easily the most dominant one in the world at the moment, alongside its siblings BA.4 and BA.5.”
He said the new dose option could bolster immunity for a full year.
"The response was so strong they are saying it might last a year,” he explained.
“So, in other words, this might be what we’re looking for. You get the vaccine that protects you for at least a year and then it becomes like the flu vaccine in a sense.”
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