HSE investigating close contacts at 800 schools since reopening 

From a testing perspective, Ms O’Berine said that HSE expects schools to be busy for the month of September.

Health officials recorded a further 1,180 cases of Covid-19 on Sunday. 

It comes as the HSE said it is investigating close contacts at more than 800 schools since they reopened last week. 

Niamh O’Beirne, the HSE lead for testing and tracing, said 500 are primary schools and more than 300 are secondary.

"Over the past week, we’ve had over 800 – a mixture of primary and secondary schools – where we’re now investigating close contacts and doing testing of those students".

“They’re individual classes and groups of students who will now go forward for close contact testing,” Ms O’Beirne told RTÉ’s This Week programme.

She said the tests will be PCR tests as opposed to the quicker antigen as there is “plenty of PCR capacity for the demand that we need”.

From a testing perspective, Ms O’Beirne said that HSE expects schools to be busy for the month of September.

“If we look last year, the second Monday in September was a busy day for testing," she said.

Ms O'Beirne said last Monday, 16,000 tests were done in the community and they expect tomorrow to be busy for community test centres.

“We will look very closely at the results of both the first test, which is a day zero test and a day 10 test for those children. And from there, make a plan going forward. 

At the moment, it is expected that there will be a degree of transmission in schools but the advice from public health has remained the same from before and all the measures are in place within the schools.

Schools are not the source of the virus, Ms O’Beirne added.

She said the cases in schools at the moment are “very early on in the academic year” so are likely from students catching the virus in the community and then going to class.

Ms O'Beirne said that testing in the 0-14 age group was 40% higher than other age cohorts, but had so far shown a lower positivity rate of around 10%.

Students in the senior cycle who have been fully vaccinated and have been identified as close contacts will not have to restrict movements if they don’t have symptoms, she added.

Outside of schools, households and social groups are two of the highest factors where the HSE is finding circumstances of close contacts.

Last week, Professor Philip Nolan, chair of the Irish Epidemiological Modelling Advisory Group, said that the evidence shows schools are not major sites of transmission.

On Saturday, the Taoiseach said Ireland should “take some heart” from early indications that rates of Covid-19 in Ireland may be declining.

Ms O’Beirne said that she agrees with the Taoiseach based on testing data.

She said the referral volume for the 15-24 age group has come “a way back” and is now in line with older age groups.

Ms O’Beirne said the positivity rate for 15-24-year-olds has also fallen from 22% to 16% highlighting a “really good” vaccine impact.