The Government has agreed to re-open pubs from September 21st.
Cabinet Ministers are meeting to discuss the impact of opening pubs in two weeks' time.
It'll be subject to any local restrictions or lockdowns that might be in place.
There's particular concern over the spread of the virus in Dublin and Limerick over the next week.
Government agreeing September 21st for re-opening of pubs. But it's being stressed that local restrictions could still apply - with most concern over Dublin and Limerick
— Seán Defoe (@SeanDefoe) September 8, 2020
Earlier, TCD associate professor of biochemistry Dr Tomás Ryan said he could not understand why pubs are being allowed re-open.
"I can't understand why we're opening the pubs so soon after opening all the schools and at the same time as opening all of the colleges and universities.
"It's an awful lot of things to be doing at the same time, when cases are steadily increasing.
"It does make sense that we're being asked to reduce contacts - because asking us to reduce contacts is one way to reduce the overall 'R' number.
"It's not clear that it's going to be effective - and because there are many things going on at the same time, it's going to be very difficult to know what things are having an effect - if any".
"I don't see the logic of opening up pubs at the same time as schools, at the same time as universities.
"Why didn't we just open up everything in June/July? The reason we didn't is because we wanted to see in June and July could we keep things under control, we wanted to learn.
"We have since then learned that we're not keeping things under control - and the reaction to that seems to be, from many elements of Government and lobby groups, 'well then just open everything up anyway'".
