Dr. Tony Holohan:

I would say “No” to the last question in regard to regional lockdowns. On its own merits, that is not in our planning at this point in time. In a more general sense, obviously, we share the concerns that the Northern Ireland authorities themselves have about the very high levels of infection. As things stand, and members will see this in some of the graphs we have circulated, we have incidence in the last seven days in Northern Ireland of 535 per 100,000 as compared to 190 here, so it is heading for threefold the level of infections we have had here, and they have been persistently higher than us, going right back to the middle of June. The experience we have had in Ireland of this so-called fourth wave is a much lower level of incidence right the way through than in every other part of the three countries that make up Great Britain and Northern Ireland, but particularly Northern Ireland, and they continue to experience the high impact of that in terms of hospitalisations.

We have a regular arrangement where my colleague, Michael McBride, and his team and I now sit down every fortnight to review the disease and to look in particular at some of these Border issues. There is no doubt that, at least in part, the persistent high incidence we have seen in the counties of Monaghan, Donegal in particular, Cavan and, from time to time, some of the other Border counties like Louth, particularly over the last two to three months, is much closer to the incidence that Northern Ireland is experiencing than the experience of the rest of the Republic of Ireland. That has been a particular challenge for people who live in those Border counties.

That is not to say that all of that can be explained by the infection, if I can put it in these terms, spilling over the Border. There is a lot of mobility between certain parts of some of those counties and Northern Ireland. It may also be the case that similar social circumstances that lead to spread and transmission in Northern Ireland apply in some of those counties as well, so it will be a mix of those kinds of reasons. There is no question but that the Border counties of Donegal, Monaghan and Cavan have experienced a very significant challenge, with high levels of infection that reflects much more what has been happening in Northern Ireland than what has been happening in the rest of the Republic, where our disease experience has been much better than any part of the UK.