Ireland's total coronavirus cases jumped today by 839 to 8,928.
That may seem like a huge rise compared to the previous few days and weeks, where we've seen the number hike up by 500 or less.
But the new figure comes about because of a change in how the Government is reporting new cases.
The Department of Health is now receiving the results of tests sent to a lab in Germany in the past days and weeks.
These are 'old' cases, but are newly-confirmed and have to be included in the grand total of cases in the Republic.
Then there are the test results from labs in Ireland.
As these are dealing with more recent cases, these reports are 'new' cases.
Combine the 'old' test results with the 'new' ones and we are now, unfortunately, getting an even more frightening figure each evening.
This might be confusing, but bear with us.
For example today, Saturday April 11, saw an increase in confirmed cases of 839, as noted above.
But the new cases number is made up of 553 new confirmed cases reported in Irish labs and 286 newly-confirmed cases in a German lab where Irish samples were sent for testing, as of 1pm today.
The 'true' number, i.e the number we've all been following so closely each day is, for today, 553 - a record rise.
The 286 German lab results, while not exactly 'new' cases, would have been reported before if confirmed in Ireland and must also be included in the daily figures and grand total.
This horribly skews any look at overall figures in the past few days, when the truth is we are still seeing just a gradual rise in cases.
It's mostly a nightmare for people who make the graphs we've all seen, with no way to tell when the initial results would have been reported and adjusting the curve as such.
But we hope we've made this easier for everyone else to follow as more results are reported in the coming days and weeks.
