A further nine people with COVID-19 have died in the Republic.

One death that had previously been classed as COVID-related has been denotified, so the total number of deaths here now stands at 1,639.

Meanwhile, 46 new cases of the virus have been confirmed, bringing the total number of cases here to 24,841.
According to the Department of Health's chief medical officer and chair of the National Public Health Emergency Team (NPHET), Dr Tony Holohan, throughout this pandemic, NPHET has consistently focused on mortality "being very aware of the sad toll of lost loved ones on families".

"A mortality paper was prepared and discussed by NPHET today and identifies that mortality in Ireland has been within the lower range in overall terms compared with other health systems across Europe.

"Ireland will continue to report both confirmed and probable deaths from COVID-19 in all settings and direct public health measures to limit the burden of mortality," Dr Holohan said.

According to the department's deputy chief medical officer, Dr Ronan Glynn, NPHET has agreed in principle to include the sudden loss of smell (anosmia) and the loss of taste (ageusia) in the case definition for testing.

"This is subject to updated guidance from the ECDC (European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control), which is expected to be published on Friday," he noted.

Meanwhile, according to Prof Philip Nolan, chair of the NPHET Irish Epidemiological Modelling Advisory Group, the reproduction number for the virus is currently estimated to be 0.5.

Furthermore, ICU and hospital admissions, as well as the number of deaths per day, continue to decline. The number of cases per day remains stable.

"Next week, we will see figures that reflect the impact of phase 1 measures on key disease spread indictors. It is our hope that the reproduction number will remain below one and our progress is preserved," he commented.

Phase 1 of the Government's Roadmap for Reopening Society and Business is now in place. For more information on this, click here.