COVID-19 infections on the rise, hospitalisations going down

COVID-19 infections are on the rise, according to the National Surveillance Report released on Friday with hospitalisations however showing a downward trend.

According to the report, as of March 14th, 355,493 COVID-19 cases have been diagnosed, of which 904 died due to COVID-19.

In the last 14 days (since March 1st, 2021), 33,488 cases were diagnosed.  The median age was 31 years, 54.6% were females and 45.4% males.

By place of exposure, information was available for 33,341 (99.6%) cases, of which 2.4% (797) were imported and 97.6% (32,544) were locally-acquired.

As of March 16th, 2022, 100 people with COVID-19 (who have not tested negative for SARS-CoV-2 after their diagnosis or who are still considered infectious) were hospitalized. The median age of hospitalized patients with COVID-19  is 73 years; 52.9%  36 out of 68 are males and 38.8% 26 out of 67 are from Limassol district.

Twenty-two cases (24.7%) still hospitalised have comorbidities.

The median age of these ICU patients is 76.

In addition, over the last 14 days, 49,534 RT PCR and 1,208,489 rapid antigen tests have been performed.

Among 33,488 cases diagnosed since March 1st, 2021, sex information was available for 26,980 (80.6%) cases, of which 54.6% were females (14,727), and 45.4% males (12,253). By age group, cases included 10,643 individuals aged 0-19 years-old (31.8%), 19,372 individuals aged 20-59 years (57.9%), and 3,462 individuals aged 60 years and older (10.3%).

Among all cases diagnosed in the last 14 days, district information was available for 26,894 (80.3%) cases, of which 9,680 (36%) were reported in Limassol district, 8,535 (31.7%) in Nicosia, 3,936 (14.6%) in Larnaca, 3,489 (13%) in Pafos, 1,209 (4.5%) in Ammochostos and 45 cases had residence abroad (0.2%).

Overall, 859 cases (10.6% of all hospitalized patients) have been admitted to ICU. The median age of patients ever admitted to ICU was 66 years. ICU patients were mainly males (536, 62.4%).

The overall median length of stay in ICU (for all ICU cases) was 12 days. The median age of these ICU patients is 76. No ICU patients have reported comorbidities.

A total of 813 ICU patients (94.6% of all ICU patients) have been intubated - currently all five patients in ICU, who are still positive for SARS-CoV-2 or considered infectious, are intubated.

As of March 14th, 2022, among cases alive, 95% (336849) of COVID-19 cases have recovered/released from isolation.

Deaths

Among cases diagnosed until March 14th, 2022, 904 COVID-19 associated deaths were reported in the Republic of Cyprus until March 16th.

Deaths occurred in 550 men (60.8%) and 354 (39.2%) women; the median age of death of persons whose death was associated with COVID-19 was 79 years. (By district of residence, deceased cases were 323 (35.7%) from Limassol, 277 (30.6%) from Nicosia, 164 (18.1%) from Larnaca, 82 (9.1%) from Pafos, 52 (5.8%) from Ammochostos.

The median time from the date of sampling to death (due to COVID-19) was 14 days.