Louise O'Reilly (Dublin Fingal, Sinn Fein)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

747. To ask the Minister for Health the number of persons that recovered from Covid-19; and the number of same that still require additional treatment and support due to the effects of the virus. [35266/20]

Stephen Donnelly (Wicklow, Fianna Fail)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

Since the National Public Health Emergency Team (NPHET) met for the first time, a commitment was given to collect and publish as much relevant data as possible while ensuring individual patient confidentiality is maintained at all times. While the nature and scale of the COVID-19 pandemic has been unprecedented, the collection of timely and comprehensive data has been instrumental in developing the health service response to Covid-19 and to the advice provided by NPHET and the Department of Health to assist Government decision-making in the wider response to the disease in Ireland.

The Deputy may wish to note that estimates of people who have recovered from Covid-19 are typically based on the number of people who were confirmed as a case and had not been hospitalised or died within a certain period, and those who had been hospitalised but were then discharged after a certain time. In the current situation where significant numbers of cases are asymptomatic or only very mildly symptomatic, these estimates are incomplete. As a result, data on the number of persons who have recovered from Covid-19 is not readily available to my Department at the present time.