Supt of Public Health Prof Charmaine Gauci, in Saturday’s Covid-19 update, said that 20 new cases had been reported in the past 24-hours, including 2 more in Gozo. The total number of cases now stands at 370.
The 2 cases in Gozo include a 30-year old Gozitan woman who is a carer at the Gozo General Hospital, she had been tested as part of the screening process, which resulted in positive, the woman was not experiencing any symptoms, Prof Gauci said.
The other is cleaner at the Gozo General Hospital, the 31-year old Albanian woman lives in Gozo. She had reported a cough on the 6th of April.
Prof Gauci said that 10 of the new cases are from the Hal-Far Centre and also includes the elderly man who died this morning.
She explained that the 10 migrants who had tested positive have already been in quarantine as the Centre had been closed since last Sunday.
Prof Gauci said that 1,288 swab tests had been carried out during the past 24-hours, with 16,016 swabs taken in total. Contact tracing is being carried out on the new cases.
Prof Gauci expressed her concern over photos she had seen of people on beaches on Good Friday, saying that even if the groups were family members, they could not possibly know if any others around them had the infection.
She advised that researchers in U.S.A. had devised a projection for Malta, assuming full social distancing, they predict that the peak for the virus in Malta will be on the 22nd of April.
Photo by Anthony Zammit