The health ministry said there had been no new deaths from Covid on Saturday and announced that 62 people had tested positive from 41,226 PCR and rapid tests, a positivity rate of 0.15 per cent.

The death toll since March 2020 remains at 378 and the number of positives over the same period comes in at 73,582, of whom 98 per cent have fully recovered, according to the latest national report.

There are currently 44 people in hospitals of whom 21 are in a serious condition. Of these nine are intubated. 11 are in ICU and one in the high-dependency unit.

Of the 41,226 positives on Saturday, 5,337 were PCR tests and 35,889 rapid tests, yielding 62 infections as follows:

  • 8 from 3,708 samples taken as part of a passenger checks at Larnaca and Paphos airports.
  • 7 from 1,502 samples taken through private initiative.
  • 1 from 127 samples processed in hospital labs
  • 46 from 35,686 samples tested under the ministry’s screening programme

In addition, 203 samples were tested in private clinical laboratories and pharmacies without turning up any positives.

From the free screening programme, Limassol had the highest number of positives with 19 out of 8,740 tests – positivity rate of 0.22 per cent.

Nicosia saw 15 positives from 13,766 tests – positivity 0.11

Larnaca counted 5 positives from 5,016 tests – positivity 0.1

Paphos had 1 positive from 4,105 tests – positivity 0.02

Famagusta area saw 5 positives from 3,389 tests – positivity 0.15

One positive was found in the National Guard from 501 tests.