"Peak of Covid cases, around February 10-15"

The Minister of Health, Alexandru Rafila, says that during the next week we can expect an increase in the number of cases of Covid-19 infections, and the 5th wave's peak of COVID infections could be in the middle of February.

Currently, the viral variants Delta and Omicron are circulating in Romania - Alexandru Rafila declared this morning on Prima TV, who also mentioned that approximately 25% of cases are infections with the Delta variant, this also causing more serious cases.

Alexandru Rafila: Somewhere around February 10-15, we will reach this maximum number of cases. One important thing, though, is that the rate of reproduction of this infection has dropped. The maximum was in the first week of January, we had a reproduction rate of 1.87, which means, practically, that one infected person made two other people ill. We now stand at 1.25 and in the last eight - nine days we have had a gradual decrease from 1.87 to 1.25 - 1.25 still being worrying because it means that the number of cases is increasing, and it will not decrease. We have 19.000 now, probably 25.000 or 28.000 next week.

According to the Minister of Health, Romania has reached a test rate of almost 100.000 people per day, and from next week there will be a substantial increase in the degree of testing that could lead to 150.000 tests per day.

Translated by: Radu Matei