A virologist at Trinity College Dublin has said Covid-19 vaccines are having less of an effect at reducing transmission and reinfection, "so we are seeing a lot of virus around at the moment".
Assistant Professor in Virology Dr Kim Roberts said there are still disruptions in society because of the high transmission rates of the virus, but the vaccine rollout in Ireland has been a huge success.
"One of the success stories for Ireland is the very, very high uptake of the vaccines and the vaccines are successfully reducing disease severity," she said.
"So that means that fewer people, far fewer people are needing hospital care, so we're not seeing the same level of impact on hospitals as we were in previous waves."
Speaking on RTÉ's Morning Ireland, Dr Roberts said data suggests that multiple waves of Covid infections should be expected for the next few years.
"Not everyone will get infected during every wave, but if we're having two, three, possibly even four waves of Covid a year, that does mean that people can get infected once a year, possibly twice a year, and again that causes disruption to people's lives."
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Dr Roberts said this will also impact on how people are supported when they are sick and said there needs to be more long-term strategies around dealing with Covid-19 because the virus "isn't going away, it is adapting and changing".
"We are in a different place now than we were, and when the pandemic started in 2020, we're not in an emergency situation. We are in a situation where we now have lots of data and lots of research around this virus," she said.
Dr Roberts said whereas at the beginning of the pandemic the information around the effectiveness of masks was not substantial, there is now a lot of data "that says that wearing masks, particularly good quality masks... are very, very effective at reducing your risk of becoming infected and reducing your risk of transmitting the virus to other people."
She said that while Covid-19 is still a factor in people's lives, people are not necessarily recognising it.
Professor of Immunology at Dublin City University Christine Loscher said Covid-19 has not been controlled globally and waves of sub variants are continuing.
Speaking on RTÉ's Today with Claire Byrne, Prof Loscher said the stepping down of testing and surveillance means it is harder to determine where "we are at with the virus at any one point" and cases are under reported.
She said hospitalisations in Ireland are currently at their highest point in some months, but said there is still a lot that can be done to minimise the impact of Covid-19 and protect people.
There are lots of advantages to wearing masks, she added.
"We seem to have lost a lot of the conversation around good ventilation indoors in public places. We seem to just not be advising the public that when we're inside just to wear masks. Even recent data has shown that if you do get a lower viral load with mask wearing, you actually can have a milder disease but still get good immunity."
She also said that 5% of people who get Covid-19 are now living with long Covid symptoms.
Meanwhile, latest figures show the number of people with Covid-19 in hospital remains above 1,000.
As of 8am, there were 1,018 patients with the virus in hospital, down 17 on the same time yesterday.
There were 45 people in intensive care units with Covid-19, down one on the same time yesterday.
