‘R’ number in NI remains 0.6 – 0.9 - this is key to decision making in Executive today

This gas held steady since last week, according to the latest update from the Department of Health.

The R number refers to the number of people person with Covid-19 is likely to infect after contracting the disease.

The Northern Ireland Executive’s target is to keep the R number below 1.

As of 21 June, the seven-day rolling average of new cases is two.

In the past seven days (from 18 June) there have been four deaths reported.

The Executive has indicated that keeping R below 1 is a key objective as we move forward in the epidemic.

However, when community transmission of the virus is very low, R will no longer be the most important number in relation to the status of the epidemic. In particular, once the number of new cases is sufficiently low in the presence of a robust testing programme and test/trace/protect strategy, number of positive tests per day is likely to be a more important measure.