The Health Service Executive's Chief Clinical Officer has said just over half of people with Covid-19 in hospitals across the country are "actually in hospital because they are sick with Covid".
Speaking on RTÉ's Morning Ireland, Dr Colm Henry said that the remainder are testing positive for Covid-19 in hospital.
As of 8am, there were 905 people with Covid-19 in hospitals around the country, up one on the same time yesterday.
Of these, 35 are in intensive care units with the virus, down one on yesterday.
The Department of Health said that there were 37 deaths associated with Covid-19 in the week up to 6 July.
Dr Henry said the Omicron variant has a "growth advantage over previous variants".
"These new sub-variants have an additional growth advantage, so it is displacing previous variants and certainly may be more transmissible, may be able to evade immunity but not causing as much serious illness perhaps in the sense of intensive care units," he said.
About 41,000 PCR tests were carried out last week on people in the more "vulnerable cohort" such as older people and those with underlying health conditions, he said.
Approximately 36% of those tests were positive and "just over 20,000 antigen tests reported positive".
Dr Henry said that: "We are in week four or five of a six-week plateau ....after which we expect the case numbers to fall in the community - but a lag time before that begins to see relief in the hospital."
He said there was a "lag time" between infection in the community and people requiring hospitalisation.
'We're in week 4 or 5 of a six week plateau,' HSE Chief Clinical Officer Dr Colm Henry gives an update on the current Covid-19 wave | Read more: https://t.co/MVj2BWsenq pic.twitter.com/BA6mYEEYE1
— RTÉ News (@rtenews) July 8, 2022
Dr Henry highlighted the importance of compliance with the basic public health advice.
"Anybody who is sick, who is feeling symptoms should isolate and remain isolated until at least 48 hours after the symptoms resolve," he said.
On vaccination, he said that it is "disappointing" that more than half of people who are hospitalised with Covid-19 or testing positive in hospital have not received their booster.
"A third of people testing positive in hospitals haven't even received their primary vaccination course," he said.
Just over half of the 730,000 people eligible for the second booster dose have received it, he said.
That group includes people who are 65 years or older, or 12 years or older with a weak immune system.
"Perhaps the same fear factor isn't there. There is a sense that this has gone away. But we do know that the vaccine wanes particularly in those groups for whom this additional booster is recommended. That is to say, older people and those with underlying health conditions," he said.
Dr Henry appealed to people who are eligible for their second booster to avail of the opportunity to get.
"There is good evidence that the vaccine they have received already wanes after a number of months and it is important that they receive that booster to protect them from infection and serious illness," he said.
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