Two more died, 542 new

In the last 24 hours, two more coronavirus-related deaths and 542 cases of new illness have been notified to the Ministry of Health.

Currently, there are a total of 65,394 confirmed cases of Covid-19 in Ireland. This includes notifications for three previously identified cases. The death toll is 1,947.

The number of ICUs is 39, down one from yesterday. There are 283 Covid-19 patients in the hospital, and 13 have been hospitalized in the last 24 hours.

Of the cases reported today, 277 are male, 264 are female, and 64% are under 45 years of age. The median age is 35 years.

There were 181 cases in Dublin, 59 cases in Donegal, 50 cases in Limerick, 36 cases in Cork, 25 cases in Kildare, and the remaining 191 cases spread to the other 20 counties.

The counties with the highest 14-day incidence per 100,000 population are Donegal (295.2), Meath (243), Limerick (220.1), Cavan (203.5) and Westmeath (198.3).

The lowest-rated counties include Leitrim (34.3), Wexford (83.5), Wicklow (89.9), Offaly (115.4), and County Tipperary (124.1). The national tax rate is 175.5.

Earlier today, Professor Philip Nolan defended the National Public Health Emergency Team from allegations of misestimating the R (reproduction) number of Covid-19 in mid-October.

The chair of the NPHET Epidemiological Modeling Advisory Group responded today to a tweet by the independent TD Michael McNamara, who was the chair of Dáil’s Special Committee on Coronavirus.

McNamara said on Twitter: “On October 22, NPHET said,” Current estimates of R are 1.3-1.4. ” That was clearly wrong. “

Professor Nolan said, “Estimations were made on October 20 based on confirmed cases until midnight on October 18. It may be helpful to explain the basic principles behind the various methods of estimating R. I don’t know. “

He explained: “R is an estimate of the virus infection rate. If a person is infected with a virus, how many people will continue to be infected on average?

“We don’t know the R of today or yesterday. If people are infected with the virus today, it will take time for the resulting infected person to show symptoms, be tracked, be tested, and be identified as a case. It will only take a reliable estimate of today’s R. In 7-14 days. “

Professor Nolan showed an example of an R of 1.4 when 10 people infected with SARS-CoV-2 on day zero infected the other 14 people.

The average time it takes one person to infect another is called the serial interval and is estimated to be about 4.5 days.

“These infections aren’t known until symptoms appear, are tracked, tested and confirmed,” Nolan said.

“This can take a variety of times. It usually takes 5-7 days for symptoms to appear and 7-12 days for a confirmed case.

“Therefore, infection cannot be measured. Infection can only be inferred from the pattern of cases over time.

“Cases do not appear in infection and lockstep and are highly variable, and some infections are not detected at all.”

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He added: “Various methods of estimating R use statistics and modeling to infer the underlying pattern of infection from known case patterns, but the most important limitation is infection that is estimated 1-2 weeks ago. (And social contact).

“There are several ways to’nowcast’R, but these have serious limitations. This is why we use a variety of indicators and analyzes rather than relying solely on R estimates to understand possible epidemic trajectories. “

HSE Chief Paul Reid also used Twitter today. “When we head to the next week, we should all be heartfelt because our actions are working,” he said.

“The cases are still too high, but unforgivable, but if all individuals and households stick to reducing contact, these will go even further. This is still important.”

Yesterday, Health Minister Stephen Donnelly welcomed some “good news” here regarding the 14-day incidence of Covid-19.

“The other good news is that Ireland’s 14-day incidence is 186 per 100,000 today. It was over 200 on Thursday and 300 a while ago,” he said on Twitter. ..

“This is the result of the country working together to push the virus back and protect each other. Let’s continue!”

in the meantime Seven more people died in Covid-19 in Northern Ireland. The official death toll was 781.

Elsewhere, the village of CoRoscommon has been completed Community Rapid Covid-19 Test Pilot Program, In 6 weeks, 150 residents participated.