The HSE has said Ireland completed its highest number of tests in a single day yesterday.
Some 13,080 tests were completed on Friday.
The health service CEO Paul Reid said the average time from doctor’s referral to the completion of contact tracing is now down to 2.1 days.
He said the vast majority were returned in “much less than two days with 98% of the tests coming back negative.
Yesterday we completed 13,000 #COVID19 tests, our highest daily number ever. End to end completion mean time now down to 2.1 days. (Referral to notification and contacts traced). 98% negative, so vast majority would have been returned in much less than 2 days. @HSELive
— Paul Reid (@paulreiddublin) August 22, 2020
Of the 61,565 tests that have been completed in the last week, 1.2% have come back positive.
As of 8am this morning, there were 20 COVID-19 patients in Irish hospitals with six in Intensive care.
There are also 76 people with suspected cases of the virus in hospital.
This afternoon the Health Minister Stephen Donnelly praised the HSE for hitting the new daily testing record.
He said the mass rollout of testing in nursing homes, direct provision and meat plants is underway.
