The dismantling of the Covid-19 mass testing system may obscure the true scale of the current wave, but few will have failed to notice that the disease is again sweeping across the country. Households, schools and workplaces are dealing with the ensuing disruption.
And, as usual, a spike in cases is producing more hospital admissions. Some 600 people are in hospital with Covid, a threefold rise in a matter of weeks. That is well short of the 1,600 recorded at the peak of the last wave in March, and a certain proportion were admitted for something else, but such a large Covid caseload puts real strain on an overburdened healthcare service.
This pattern of recurring waves was widely predicted. Widespread immunity conferred by vaccines and prior infection, notwithstanding the different properties of the now-prevalent Omicron sub-variants, have loosened the link between case numbers and deaths. For most people, Covid is a mild if unpleasant illness. That changes the nature of the pandemic and the public health response it demands. And so, even as cases surge, the Government is scaling back the contact tracing system. For now at least, the reintroduction of restrictions is not on the agenda, and even mask mandates divide opinion among experts.
Yet the handling of the current wave does raise questions. Given recent surges in South Africa, Portugal and elsewhere, there was ample evidence for weeks that Ireland was likely to experience a sharp rise in infections driven by those sub-variants. It is also well-established that vaccine-derived immunity wanes relatively quickly, and that having had Omicron does not necessarily shield against newer sub-variants.
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Yet there was little or no public communication to suggest a new wave was on the way and to urge the public to take their own protective steps, including mask-wearing. Uptake of the second vaccine booster dose among over-65s is at less than 50 per cent. Given that more than 70 per cent of people in hospital with the virus are in that age bracket, take-up must increase. It is also important that the immuno-compromised not be forgotten; for them, these are very stressful and isolating times.
The most visible effect of the winding down of the National Public Health Emergency Team (Nphet) was patchier public communications on Covid. That should be put right. In the best-case scenario, this wave will peak within a few weeks and then rapidly recede.
But it is almost certain that another one will not be long in coming. And there is no guarantee that each successive wave will be the same; a more virulent strain could cause havoc. So it is essential that health service contingency planning for such an eventuality continues, and that steps are taken to ensure that pandemic infrastructure – including mass testing, contact tracing and large-scale vaccination – can be rebuilt as quickly as it has been dismantled.