There have been a further 38 deaths due to Covid-19 in the Republic confirmed today, bringing the total number of deaths in this pandemic to 444.

The Health Protection Surveillance Centre has said that as of today there have now been a total of 12,547 confirmed cases of Covid-19 in Ireland with the addition of 1,068 new cases confirmed today.

Of those deaths announced today, 29 were located in the east of the country, 6 were in the west, and another 3 were in the south.

The median age of those who died in today’s tally was 84, and 28 of them were reported as having underlying health conditions.

The total number of Covid-19 cases in Galway has now risen to 237 with the confirmation of a further 17 cases today.

Dr. Tony Holohan, Chief Medical Officer, Department of Health said “We are continuing to monitor the course of this disease across a range of indicators”.

“Not only in the number of confirmed cases and deaths reported but also through hospital and ICU admissions, clusters and patterns of transmission.”

“While a number of these parameters are going in a positive direction, it is clear that we need to keep going in our efforts, on an individual level, to limit the spread of this virus.”

So far 1,968 cases in Ireland have required hospitalisation, and of those 280 have been admitted to the ICU.

Healthcare workers make up almost a quarter of cases, with 2,872 confirmed to date.

Dr Siobhan Ni Bhriain, Consultant Psychiatrist and HSE Integrated Care Lead, said “There are still concerning reports that attendance to emergency departments is unusually low. This concerns us.”

“Everyone should continue to seek medical intervention if concerned about their health”

“Do not ignore symptoms of illness because of fear of contracting COVID-19 or fear of imposition on healthcare staff. The health service is there for everyone and all medical concerns.”

Of the cases confirmed in Ireland to date, community transmission has been identified as the cause in 52% of cases, local transmission is responsible for 42%, and 6% of cases are connected to travel abroad.

There have been 23 new cases of COVID-19 recorded in Galway in the latest figures released today, bringing the total in the county to 220.

The National Public Health Emergency Team confirmed today that there have been 832 new cases of COVID-19 confirmed in the Republic of Ireland as of Tuesday, bringing the country’s total number of cases to 11,479.

There were 41 new deaths from COVID-19, the highest number recorded in a single day so far, bringing the total number of deaths in the Republic to 406.

Of those deaths, 36 were in the east of the country, four were in the west, and one was in the south.

The people who died included 16 women and 25 men, and 31 of them had underlying medical conditions. The median age of today’s reported deaths was 85.

The NPHET met on Tuesday to discuss the number of clusters in nursing homes around the country, and putting in place a plan to better track them there, and in other residential settings.

Dr. Tony Holohan, Chief Medical Officer, said “We remain concerned about the prevalence of COVID-19 in nursing homes and residential care settings.”

“The National Public Health Emergency Team is monitoring developments in these facilities and continues to advance supports and actions where needed.”

“From the beginning, we have been aware that vulnerable groups, including the elderly, are at greater risk from this virus. These groups will continue to be our priority.”

Of the new cases confirmed today, 548 were reported by Irish laboratories, and 284 were confirmed by a lab in Germany.

So far 90,646 tests for Covid-19 have been carried out as of midnight on Monday, 62,952 of which were sent to Irish laboratories, and 27,694 of which were completed in a laboratory in Germany.

Over the past week, 20,468 tests were carried out in Irish laboratories and of these 4,233 were positive.

Dr. Cillian De Gascun, Chair of NPHET’s Expert Advisory Group said; “Having come through a challenging few weeks, we have significantly strengthened testing capacity and will continue to do so over the coming week, to put us in a very strong position to identify and suppress the virus.”

Dr. Colm Henry, Chief Clinical Officer with the HSE, said “We are not seeing a significant increase in the number of COVID-19 positive cases in our hospitals or our ICU’s over the last number of days.

He added that this is “down to the efforts of every individual who has followed advice to stay apart and slow the spread of the virus. To everyone playing their part, the health service is grateful.”

The official number of confirmed COVID-19 cases in Ireland rose to 8,928 yesterday after test results which were sent to Germany for testing were included in the figures.

The number of cases in Galway, as of midnight on Thursday, now stands at 169, after nine more people were diagnosed with the disease in yesterday’s data.

Behind every number in these statistics is a person with a disease caused by a virus with no cure. Every number has a name.

While keeping this in mind, statistics are important in order to analyse the current situation for the government and health experts and can offer insights into where countries stand, especially when making predictions.

One way which experts are looking at the number of cases and deaths is by calculating the number of confirmed cases or deaths per 100,000 people.

It is by using this calculation that the Spanish media is reporting that the country now has the world’s highest mortality rate, despite Italy reporting more deaths.

Crime rates are often calculated in this way to give a truer picture of the prevalence of crime in a city or area.

Using this formula, and ignoring microstates and other countries with very small populations, Ireland is the sixth worst affected country in the world in terms of confirmed cases, after Spain, Italy, France, Belgium and Switzerland.

Before looking at the numbers, however, it is important to remember one or two things.

Comparing the number of deaths per 100,000 population is not without its flaws. And it’s the same with confirmed cases.

Individual counties have their own methods of testing and reporting cases. Counties which have tested rigourously will report more cases than countries which are only testing people who are experiencing significant health problems.

Secondly, not every country is at the same stage of the crisis – Italy, for example, was reporting thousands of cases before the reality sank in for many European nations, which were at the time relatively unaffected by the virus.

Finally, the smallest countries in Europe in terms of population and size tend to have a much higher number of confirmed cases per 100,000 people than larger countries.

Andorra, Luxemburg, San Marino and the Vatican City make up the top four most affected countries using this formula. But these microstates have very small populations and are situated between or surrounded by other countries with a large number of COVID-19 cases. Built up areas also tend to have much more cases – big cities are more generally affected than rural areas.

While bearing all of this in mind, let’s see where we stand in comparison to other regions and countries.

The Republic now has 8,928 cases and an estimated population of just over 4.9 million.

That means that the state has 180 cases per 100,000 population.

The table below lists a selection of countries, cities and regions and the number of confirmed cases of COVID-19 per 100,000 people, using the latest data available.