The level of coronavirus in the country is much worse than reported with a leading expert claiming “it's Covid soup out there".
Professor Cliona Ní Cheallaigh said that the number of real cases is being "vastly under-reported" due to antigen testing.
The consultant in infectious diseases said that the public is lucky that the current variant is much milder and that most people who are vaccinated are not getting severely unwell.
Speaking on RTE radio’s Brendan O'Connor programme, she said Covid cases are still high and are "vastly under-reported”.
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She said: “There’s a lot of virus around… if you don’t want to get it, wear a mask. It’s Covid soup out there.
“The numbers are high and they’re vastly underreported because a lot of people are using antigen testing because of a change in testing policy and you have to be a fairly good girl like myself to upload the results of antigen tests on the web.”
Prof Ní Cheallaigh said wearing face masks slows the transmission of the virus, but said that from what she can see most people are no longer wearing them.
Prof Ní Cheallaigh said long Covid remains an issue for many people who are "very disabled" with it and there is still a limited understanding of it.
Meanwhile the number of people with Covid-19 in hospital continues to increase rapidly.
This morning there were 1,569 people with the virus in hospitals around the country, an increase of 111 on the previous day.
This compares to 1,185 the previous Sunday and 957 two weeks ago, a rise of almost 64%.
The figures also represent the highest level in 14 months - since January 28 last year - when it stood at 1,620.
On the plus side, the number of people with the coronavirus in intensive care units remains relatively stable.
Separately, the general secretary of the Irish Nurses and Midwives Organisation Phil Ní Sheaghda said the union is "very concerned" about what she described as "a general view that the pandemic no longer exists".
She told RTÉ's This Week programme that healthcare staff face "an extraordinary battle on a daily basis" tackling Covid-19 and appealed to people to continue wearing face masks.
She said: "Now, this is a small measure. It's . . about congregated settings, and it's about public transport - wearing masks on public transport.
"Wearing masks when you enter a shop, wearing masks, particularly when you enter a hospital. All of the working workers in those settings, in hospitals and healthcare facilities, will continue to wear masks.”
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