Minister for Health Simon Harris expects the current restrictions will have to remain in place for a period of weeks .
Speaking to Virgin Media, Mr Harris said he expects to be advised tomorrow to keep the significant restrictions to slow the spread of coronavirus.
“What’s highly likely tomorrow is that the National Public Health Emergency Team will recommend that we continue with the very strict restrictions. I expect that to be a period of weeks,” he said.
Mr Harris also said, Ireland will have to move onto a "different terrain" after that.
“In relation to the roadmap, there is going to be a point in this country where we will have to live alongside the virus, for want of a better phrase, where sadly people will still get sick and sadly some people will still die, but [the virus] is at a rate that is sustainable for our doctors to manage.”
People have been asked to stay inside as much as possible, except for necessary journeys including exercise within 2 kilometres of their home, since March 28th.
People over 70 were asked to stay inside “cocoon” for the period in order to curb the spread of coronavirus, also known as Covid-19.”
New powers
On Tuesday, gardaí have been given new powers to enforce rules designed to keep as many people at home as possible.
Fears of rising public complacency about the virus were echoed by gardaí who are monitoring more than 1,000 locations in the State including forest walks and beaches in the run-up to the Easter holidays to ensure compliance.
Garda Deputy Commissioner John Twomey said gardaí had noticed that people were “beginning to get tired” of the social-distancing regulations.
The regulations are based on the guidelines issued by the Government two weeks ago. Anyone exercising more than 2km from their home or with people from outside their household will be in breach. Anyone travelling beyond 2km for non-essential reasons will also be in breach.
An offence will only be committed if a person refuses a direction from a garda to comply with the regulations. It is not the breaching of the regulations that is illegal, it is the disobeying of the Garda’s instructions once you are caught.
The State’s health emergency team on Wednesday said a further 25 people had died from the virus – the second-highest number of deaths in the daily announcement. The deaths of 15 men and 10 women, whose median age was 80, brought the death toll to 235.
There were 365 new cases of the disease confirmed on Wednesday, bringing total cases past the 6,000 mark for the first time, to 6,074 known cases in the Republic.
Medics have raised concerns about a possible surge in patients later this month if members of the public did not adhere to social-distancing requirements over the Easter weekend.