John McGahon (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I pay tribute to the Minister on the work he is doing while having to put up with the behaviour of what I can only describe as Neanderthals. I am referring to how they have targeted him personally and politicians' private homes. I commend the Minister on the work he is able to do while having to deal with this. It is very much appreciated by Members of the Oireachtas of all political parties and none.

At times over the past 18 months it has been very easy to lose perspective. In this regard, consider where we are today by comparison with where we were last year. Last year we did not have vaccines, and antigen tests were not in use. We had to lock down the entire country when we had the number of cases we have today because we did not have any other way to combat the problem. Fast forward 12 months and we have one of the highest vaccination rates in Europe, which is incredible when one sees the problems Austria and other countries face in trying to vaccinate their populations. It is an incredible tribute to the Irish population that we have such a high vaccination rate. It is sometimes lost on people in this country how well we are doing in that respect.

We now have antigen tests. We are able to keep the vast majority of sectors in our country up and running despite the current case numbers. That is the perspective that is needed. I have said before that there are elements of the media that, for whatever reason, are happy to play Chicken Little and say the sky is falling in because of the prospect of a new variant coming along, only for us to find out the following day, from the small bit of evidence we have, that the symptoms are quite mild.

The second point on perspective is that I feel the case numbers announced every night are sometimes a little disingenuous because there are so many non-current cases included. It is difficult for people who are watching every evening to understand the trend. When one digs into the figures for the past couple of weeks, one sees a tapering off, a decline in case numbers, fewer people coming out of intensive care units and fewer people having to go to hospital. This is because we are vaccinated and because vaccinations have worked so well. That needs to be brought into the debate. We need to take a deep breath, take a step back and have perspective.

The term "living with Covid" has been thrown around so much over the past 18 months. My view on living with Covid involves vaccination, accepting Covid is in the community and doing our very best to keep the country open as much as possible, based on listening to the scientific evidence and the Government making decisions thereon.

On the potential new measures, I do not want to make any guesses. I do not believe there is a need at this stage for additional or tougher restrictions, especially when we see the direction of the numbers and how well we are doing. It is forgotten, because of the Chicken Little narrative of the sky falling in, that we are now in a much better place today than the best possible outcome for today that was suggested by the NPHET modelling. Therefore, we are in a really good place. It would be very difficult to argue in favour of further restrictions.

On school numbers, schools have not suddenly become crazy, unsafe places. The virus is thriving in places where people are not vaccinated, including schoolchildren between nine and 12. It is for this reason that we see a high rate in the schools.