Covid-19 deaths surpass 10,000 in Ireland

It comes as the Government announced it will hold an evaluation of what happened during the peak pandemic years from January 2020 to the end of February 2022.

Figures on weekly covid-19 cases, hospitalisations, and deaths continue to be released by the Health Protection Surveillance Centre.

The last time a total number of deaths starting from when the pandemic reached Ireland in early 2020 was released was in April, when the figure stood at 9,559.

This indicates 513 more people have died with the virus since then in Ireland.

Data is not collected on long covid although anecdotal evidence indicates this remains a risk.

A recent report from the emerging health threats function expert steering group warned that Ireland needs to be better prepared should another pandemic arise despite performing “very well” against covid-19.

“Ireland performed very well in its response to the onset of the covid-19 pandemic with excess mortality being among the lowest in Europe, surges in hospitalisation were of a lower and shorter duration than many other European countries while vaccination rates were among the highest,” the group, chaired by Professor Mary Horgan, said.

Globally, the World Health Organization recorded 7.1m deaths linked to covid-19 up to October 20.