Health chiefs are warning families to keep their distance from each other this Mother's Day.
The harsh direction came from the Chief Medical Officer, Dr Tony Holohan, on Friday night ahead of the traditional celebrations on Sunday.
Dr Holohan was speaking as another 126 new cases of coronavirus cases were confirmed last night, bringing the new national total to 683.
He said that, unfortunately, if we gather in large groups to celebrate, it could pose the same risks as if we started gathering again in pubs again, which has already been banned and accepted by society.
Sunday is Mother's Day and Dr Holohan is afraid that people might ignore social distancing on this special day.
He said that it is just as important as the drastic pub closing measures that we keep away from each other this weekend.
Dr Holohan said: “We want to continue to re-emphasise the importance of social distancing.
“I understand that’s a challenge for individuals, that’s a challenge for families, that’s a challenge for society.
“But the importance in maintaining distance in social circumstances, if we have, for example, taken measures as a society to close pubs, for example, if that then is replaced by families in social activity outside the pubs that involves the same kind of social interaction in a crowd, that would carry the same kind of social risk.
“So we’ll be encouraging people in terms of personal responsibility, to follow the guidance that we have already issued.”
These measures include staying two metres away from people at all times (social distancing), washing your hands thoroughly and regularly, and always coughing or sneezing into the corner of your elbow or a tissue, and then throwing that away into a bin.
126 new cases of coronavirus were confirmed by the Department of Health last night.
This is lower than the 191 reported on Thursday evening, but Dr Holohan has warned against complacency as he said figures can easily fluctuate.
He said: “It is too early to put any emphasis on the smaller figure today.
“These are small numbers in the overall context and sometimes they can jump around a bit.
“I don’t want people to draw a conclusion from Thursday and today.”
He added that when cases are reported do not necessarily match the days people got infected.
There are now 683 confirmed cases of Coronavirus, Covid-19, in the Republic of Ireland.
Despite the drop in daily numbers on Friday, Dr Holohan said that we are still in the very early stages of the emergency and that the surge is still yet to come.
Monaghan is the only county left that has no reported coronavirus cases yet.
Numbers are expected to spike again over the weekend as the models predict we are still on the way towards 15,000 cases nationally by the end of the month in a worst case scenario.
Meanwhile, Simon Harris has called on private hospitals to agree terms with his department over the use of vacant beds and ventilators for the national emergency.
The Minister for Health said that there are 1,900 beds and 164 ventilators that may be lying idle in the private clinics that could possibly be used to treat coronavirus patients.
