More than 30,000 Covid cases reported over the weekend as officials call for caution

While roughly half of the Covid patients currently in hospital were admitted for other illnesses and found to also have the virus, health officials said they still need to be given special treatment.

A resurgence in Covid-19 infections has seen more than 30,000 cases diagnosed in three days and hospitals having to deal with more than 1,000 patients with the virus for the first time since mid-January.

“The fact that we have 544 patients on trolleys today and over 1,042 patients in hospitals with Covid-19 almost two years to the day that the virus first reached our shores is a recipe for disaster,” said Phil Ní Sheaghdha, general secretary of the Irish Nurses and Midwives Organisation (INMO).