Another 15,068 cases of Covid-19, 32 deaths, fewer hospitalisations

  • Lusa
  • 8 March 2022

The number of active cases increased on Tuesday to 475,168, up 2,387 from Monday, and 12,649 people have recovered in the past 24 hours, to a total of 2,856,458 since the pandemic began.

Portugal has recorded 15,068 new SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus infections in the last 24 hours, 32 more deaths associated with Covid-19, and a reduction in hospital admissions, the national health authority (DGS) said on Tuesday.

According to the DGS daily epidemiological bulletin, 1,225 people are hospitalised this Tuesday, 25 fewer than on Monday. At the same time, there are now 78 patients in intensive care units, three fewer than the previous day. However, not all hospitalisations are due to Covid-19 and may be motivated by other pathologies despite infection with SARS-CoV-2.

The number of active cases increased on Tuesday to 475,168, up 2,387 from Monday, and 12,649 people have recovered in the past 24 hours, to a total of 2,856,458 since the pandemic began.

The number of people in intensive care is the lowest since November 18 2021, when 72 Covid-19 patients were admitted to these units.

The 78 people requiring intensive care represent 30.5% of the critical threshold of 255 occupied beds defined in the “red lines” that assess the risk of the pandemic through various indicators.

Of the 32 deaths in the last 24 hours, 13 occurred in the Lisbon and Tagus Valley region, 10 in the Centre, four in the North, two in the Azores, two in Madeira and one in the Algarve, with no deaths recorded in the Alentejo.

By age groups, 20 elderly people over 80 years old died, five people between 70 and 79 years old, four between 60 and 69 years old and three between 50 and 59 years old.

Most of the new infections were diagnosed in the Lisbon and Tagus Valley region, with 5,854 cases, followed by the Centre (3,607), the North (2,377), the Alentejo (1,111), the Algarve (875), Madeira (733) and the Azores (511).

Since the start of the pandemic in March 2020, the Lisbon and Tagus Valley region has registered 1,189,610 cases and 8,793 deaths.

There have been 1,244,319 infections and 6,496 deaths in the North region, and the Centre region has had 510,691 infections and 3,786 deaths.

The Algarve totals 140,046 infections and 697 deaths, and the Alentejo adds 123,622 cases and 1,186 deaths from covid-19.

The Autonomous Region of Madeira records, since the beginning of the pandemic, 83,389 infections and 193 deaths and the Azores archipelago 61,197 cases and 97 deaths.

The regional authorities of the Azores and Madeira publish their data daily, which may not coincide with the information disclosed in the DGS bulletin.

According to the DGS, 3,352,874 cases of infection were counted in Portugal, of which 1,557,322 in men and 1,792,580 in women, with 2,972 cases of unknown sex, which are under investigation, as this information is not provided automatically.

Since March 2020, 21,248 people have died from Covid-19, 11,178 men and 10,070 women.

Covid-19 has caused at least 5,996,378 deaths worldwide since the start of the pandemic, according to the most recent assessment by the agency France-Presse, released on Monday.

The disease is caused by the SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus, detected in late 2019 in Wuhan, a city in central China.

The Omicron variant, which spreads and mutates rapidly, has become dominant in the world since it was first detected in November in South Africa.