Health Minister Stephen Donnelly has said the focus right now has to be “doing everything that is necessary to suppress this virus.”
Speaking to reporters on his way into Cabinet, he said: “While we get vaccinating initially the nursing homes, people in the nursing homes and the residents and critically our frontline healthcare workers as well.
“We need to keep people safe, we need to keep people alive and we need to keep our hospital system and our healthcare system open.
“So obviously very serious decisions have to be looked at today.”
The Cabinet is having an emergency meeting this afternoon, where Ministers will discuss the latest proposals from the National Public Health Emergency Team.
Chief Medical Officer Dr Tony Holohan and his colleagues have recommended that Ireland enters a full-scale Level Five lockdown.
Such a move would see non-essential retail, gyms, leisure centres, golf courses and tennis clubs all close, possibly from midnight.
It would come as another gigantic blow to the retail sector, and the potential move has left bosses "bewildered and extremely disappointed."
The closure of non-essential retail would see around 40,000 workers put back on the Pandemic Unemployment Payment (PUP).
Once this afternoon's Cabinet meeting concludes, Taoiseach Micheal Martin is expected to make a State of the Nation address outlining the Government's plans.
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