A top Irish medic has pleaded with the public to wear face coverings in crowded settings to protect those vulnerable to Covid-19.
There are concerns the most transmissible variant yet - the BA2 - could be in Ireland already, according to a leading doctor.
There are 1,308 Covid-19 patients in hospital, 49 of which are in ICU, according to the latest data.
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Covid Adviser to the Irish College of General Practitioners Dr Mary Favier urged the public to reduce the spread of the virus with basic precautions to protect the vulnerable.
She said: "There are of course, people who do need to be very careful and we as a society need to support them by doing things like wearing masks as much as we can in public places in crowded environments, wearing them on public transport."
But the top doc said the new wave did not warrant new restrictions being introduced as it is just a "nuisance" for most now.
She said: "It's not a small thing to reintroduce restrictions, it's a significant move to restrict people's liberty. So, we have to to ask, would it be proportionate to what the cases are at the moment and considering the significant illness and death continue to be low - it's a nuisance of an illness for most people now."
She added that the health care system was still struggling to catch up with the backlog from Covid-19 and it would be helpful if the public did their bit to keep cases down.
She said: "We are as we see in general practice trying to catch up with a huge backlog of work from two years of Covid."
Previously, a Dublin carer has slammed Ireland's health system after he was left waiting for 24 hours in Tallaght A&E.
Mark Wilson's disabled son was referred to the emergency department for suspected appendicitis on Friday, March 4.
He was immediately appalled by the lack of space in the waiting room when they arrived at 11:30am.
Mark told Dublin Live that the 24-hour waiting time was unacceptable, and that people were left sleeping on the ground waiting for a doctor.
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