Dr Tony Holohan says there's nothing inevitable about a third wave of Covid-19.
It comes as officials are making plans for how Christmas 2020 will play out.
Level five measures are due to expire on the 1st of December, but what comes next?
There's fears about another spike in infections once restrictions relax.
Department of Health COVID-19 Press Briefing https://t.co/FIu41faDjL
— Department of Health (@roinnslainte) November 9, 2020
Chief Medical Officer Dr Tony Holohan says the lower we can get case numbers before Christmas, the better;
"We also have work to do with strengthening our pubic health system.
"If we can do that, and if the public can maintain a continuing very high level of compliance with the advice that's in place, there's nothing inevitable about a third wave.
"We can influence when it happens and we can influence how significant it is", he insisted.
As of midnight Sunday 8th November, the @hpscireland has been notified of 270 confirmed cases of #COVID19. There is now a total of 65,659 confirmed cases of #COVID19 in Ireland.
— Department of Health (@roinnslainte) November 9, 2020
Validation resulted in the denotification of 5 cases. The figure of 65,659 cases reflects this.
Hopes for a vaccine swelled yesterday with the news that Pfizer's working to apply for emergency approval for theirs.
Dr Cillian de Gascun, from the National Virus Reference Laboratory, says more concrete data is needed to back up the claims:
"It's very early days.
"If there are positive stories the companies can give, I think it's probably useful to do that.
"But I think it's really important that there's a very short timeframe between the press release and the actual scientific data", he warned.
UPDATE: We are proud to announce, along with @BioNTech_Group, that our mRNA-based #vaccine candidate has, at an interim analysis, demonstrated initial evidence of efficacy against #COVID19 in participants without prior evidence of SARS-CoV-2 infection.
— Pfizer Inc. (@pfizer) November 9, 2020
Initial results show the Pfizer vaccine can prevent more than 90% of people getting the virus.
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