Returning to work in offices is under the spotlight again after figures showed that more than a third of Covid-19 outbreaks are in the workplace.
As the Delta variant rises, there is an increasing number of younger workers testing positive.
Niamh O’Beirne, the national lead for testing and tracing for the HSE, said workplace outbreaks accounted for 35.1pc of recent cases, as contact tracers report growing numbers of positive cases in workplaces that are open.
During the period from July 13 to August 9, Ms O’Beirne said 114 outbreaks or clusters have been identified. Of those, 41 were in workplace settings. The second highest number of outbreaks occurred in social settings.
“Workplaces are the settings where we are getting the highest number of outbreaks and associate cases,” she told independent.ie
She added “After workplaces social gatherings have accounted for 12 outbreaks. That could be a social gathering in a home, indoors or outdoors. It can be meeting a group of friends or a group of people.
“When you look at hotels, restaurants and pubs, we still don’t have huge numbers. They are still quite small relative to all the other outbreak settings. Weddings are coming up a lot more and in some cases, not all, quite large outbreaks associated with weddings.
“We recently had 30 people contracting the virus at a wedding out of 50, that’s probably the largest.”
Data reports on outbreak settings have been unavailable since the HSE cyber attack.
The last available data in relation to clusters showed there were 311 outbreaks notified for the week ending May 8, 2021. Seventeen of those (5.5pc) were attributed to workplace settings.
In relation to workplace outbreaks, Ms O’Beirne said the latest cases were among younger people.