Thread by @andrewflood

Good news in #Covid19Ireland pos-swabs with just 1682 at 9% positivity. Tuesday is often the lowest day each week with Wednesday being quite a bit higher and there were 'only' 18559 tests but continued descent is welcome, if this pattern continues... /1

last Tuesday was 2521 so this weeks 1682 is 67% of that. A weekly reduction at that rate would go
Jan26th 1127
F2 755
F9 506
Feb 16 229
F23 220
March2 148
M9 99
This is overly optimistic as it starts with lowest day of week, more realistic using 3 day averages ../2

Using a 3 day average of reduction & cases gives 2179 reducing to 68% each week getting us under 100 cases a day in 8 weeks / mid March
Jan26 1479
Feb2 1003
F9 681
Feb16 462
F23 314
March2 213
M9 144
M16 98
M23 67
/3

Important to note though quite a small change that reduced the reduction to 78% of previous week would mean it takes 13 and not 8 weeks to get under 100
1699
1326
1034
806
629
491
383
299
233
182
142
110
86

The new variant rising as proportion of cases could make a change of that size, as could partial reopening of schools, more people returning to work etc. On the other had more people working from home could shorten the 8 weeks to 6. Quite small changes have big consequences

Cases were over 300 higher than swabs today and in fact cases have been higher than swabs for the last 6 days. It would you wonder if the backlog being cleared 2nd time around also may in fact have had another bit of backlog.