Number of Covid patients in hospital at lowest in 115 days

Last Monday night, which was a bank holiday had 263 people with the disease on wards while last night that had fallen to 203.

This morning, there are 206 people with Covid-19 in Irish hospitals - the lowest in 115 days.

The figure has fallen from 227 yesterday and is a drop of 21% from last Tuesday.

In the past 24 hours, there were 19 discharges from hospitals while there were 11 admission related to the virus.

Overnight in ICU, there were 50 patients with the disease.

No new deaths were reported by the Department of Health yesterday while 394 new cases were detected.

The country's five-day moving average now stands at 404, which is down 23% on last week.

The National Public Health Emergency Team (Nphet) will warn TDs and Senators later that the risk of a fourth wave of Covid-19 remains 'considerable' if restrictions are eased too quickly.

Members of the group will be before the Oireachtas Health Committee to provide an update on the country's fight against the virus.

Acting Chief Medical Officer, Dr Ronan Glynn, will tell members a further wave can be mitigated if social contacts remains unchanged over the next six weeks.

Immunologist, Dr Lara Dungan, says the risk of another spike in cases is a real possibility so long as young people remain unvaccinated.

"There's always a huge risk of a fourth wave in Ireland, we are seeing fourth waves across the continent of Europe," said Dr Dungan.

"Ireland has been, overall, so good. We had some rough times in January but overall we have been brilliant.

"I think it's really important to note that the cases tend to be in young people. Nearly three-quarters of all our cases are in those under 45 and those people are not being vaccinated."