Ireland's Covid-19 cases rose by over 400 again on Thursday as health officials warned the country needs to get back on track.
The country is less than two weeks away from the scheduled exit from Level Five but case numbers are not as low as hoped.
Plans at the start of lockdown were to get numbers down as low as 100 or less before exiting to Level Three on December 1.
However, with over 10 days to go it is looking less and less likely.
Here's a quick rundown of all the Covid updates you need to know about this morning;
EU vaccine hope
The European Union could approve two vaccines by the end of December with them being rolled out to places like Ireland in early 2021.
EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said on Thursday night that the jabs by Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna would be assessed by the European Medicines Agency before the midway point of next month.
The chief said: "And if all proceeds with no problems, EMA tells us that the conditional marketing authorisation for BioNTech and Moderna could happen as early as the second half of December 2020."
Dr Holohan warning
Dr Holohan told reporters at Thursday's briefing: "We have in a sense lost a week in the six weeks given the trajectory we were on.
"We now need to make up that time between now and the end of November. The way we can each individually do that is really focus on driving down our numbers of contacts, so that is our overriding message today."
However when asked whether "losing a week" meant we would face an extra week of Level Five, Dr Holohan added: "I wouldn't take that inference."
Level Five decision date set
The Chief Medical Officer has confirmed that the National Public Health Emergency Team will meet next Thursday, November 26.
The most likely date for a full Cabinet decision is the Friday after NPHET's meeting, which in this instance would be November 27.
However on some occasions, depending on the nature of NPHET's recommendation, the Government decision-making process has taken place over a number of days.
