Coronavirus: two deaths, 727 people test positive on Sunday (Updated)

The health ministry announced two deaths from Covid-19 on Sunday and that 727 more people had tested positive from 73,053 PCR and rapid tests, a positivity rate of 1 per cent.

The deaths concerned a man aged 76 and a woman aged 83, both of whom died at Limassol hospital, bringing total deaths to 404 with an average age of 77.3 years.

There are  276 people in hospitals of whom 71 are in serious condition. Of these 32 are intubated.  The ministry said 88.8 per cent of patients are unvaccinated.

Of the 73,053 diagnoses made on Sunday, 7,011 were PCR and 66,042 were rapid tests, yielding 727 positives as follows:

• 1 from 56 samples taken through contact tracing 
• 9 from 4,300 samples taken during passenger checks at the airports.
• 107 from 2,594 samples taken through private initiative.
• 7 from 52 samples processed at hospital labs.
• 32 from 967 samples tested in private clinical laboratories and pharmacies.
• 571 from 65,075 samples tested under the mass testing programme 

From the free testing programme that found 571 positives:

• 181 were in Nicosia – positivity 0.74
• 148 were in Limassol – positivity 0.96
• 92 were in Larnaca – positivity 0.93
• 70 were in Paphos – positivity 0.86
• 63 were in the Famagusta area – positivity 1.07

Four positives were found in Limassol care homes from 47 tests, and nine positives were found in Larnaca care homes from 154 tests.