A total of 13 counties account for the latest jump of 50 coronavirus cases confirmed on Wednesday.
Somewhat surprisingly, Wexford saw the biggest jump of all with 11 new cases in the space of 24 hours.
This is despite the south-east spot having one of the best coronavirus records in Ireland - they have had less than 1% of the countries cases since the pandemic began.
The other new cases were made up of 10 in Kildare, 6 in Dublin, 5 in Donegal, and 18 are spread across nine other counties (Carlow, Cork, Limerick, Louth, Meath, Offaly, Sligo, Tipperary and Wicklow).
42 of these cases are associated with outbreaks or close contact with a confirmed cases - just four are community transmission.
81% of them are in people aged under 45.
Speaking after today's announcement Dr Ronan Glynn, Acting Chief Medical Officer, said; “I know the decision yesterday not to move to Phase 4 will have been disappointing for many.
"However, NPHET’s priority must be to control the spread of this virus in our communities and to protect the progress that we have achieved to date.
"Covid-19 is an extremely contagious virus and we have seen a significant increase in its spread across multiple counties over recent days. We are monitoring this very closely.
"Our focus over the coming weeks will be on continuing every effort to slow the spread of the virus so that our schools can reopen, our healthcare services resume, and our nursing homes are protected
“I would also like to emphasise again the importance of continuing to practice safe behaviours such as physical distancing, washing our hands regularly, wearing a face covering where appropriate, avoiding crowds and downloading the COVID-19 Tracker app. Doing these things makes a real difference when it comes to controlling the spread of this virus.”
