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COVID-19: 21,098 New Cases Reported In Ireland

Some 1,395 patients are hospitalised with the virus - an increase of 57 on yesterday
Jack Quann
Jack Quann

3:35 PM - 23 Mar 2022



COVID-19: 21,098 New Cases Rep...

News

COVID-19: 21,098 New Cases Reported In Ireland

Jack Quann
Jack Quann

3:35 PM - 23 Mar 2022



There have been 21,098 further cases of COVID-19 reported in Ireland.

The Health Protection Surveillance Centre (HPSC) says it's been notified of 7,038 PCR-confirmed cases.

While 14,060 people registered a positive antigen test through the HSE portal yesterday.

As of 8.00am, 1,395 patients were hospitalised with the virus - an increase of 57 on yesterday.

Some 55 of these were in ICU, which is down from 61 on Tuesday.

It comes as HSE chief Paul Reid said Ireland's hospitals are battling a ‘perfect storm’ of high COVID cases, Emergency Department attendances and staff absences.

Mr Reid said around half the hospital patients were diagnosed with COVID after being admitted for other ailments, but warned that the virus is still have a "very significant impact" on hospitals because each patient has to be treated infection prevention and control measures.

He earlier said there are several issues impacting hospitals and healthcare settings.

"Our real concerns in our hospitals and healthcare settings are five key things.

"The first thing is the high levels of transmission we are seeing in the community are having a very significant impact on hospitalisations.

"The second point is, we are seeing record levels of emergency department attendances now that we have never seen before week-on-week.

"The third one is, of those emergency department attendances, a significant proportion are older persons who are attending and that leads to higher admissions levels – about 50%.

"Then the nursing homes, we now have 64% of our nursing homes, which is impacting on our discharges from hospital and finally, like every industry in every sector, we are seeing a significant growth in staff absences through COVID-positive cases among staff.

"So, that is a whole kind of perfect storm of issues impacting on us in our health system."



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