The director of the Croatian Institute for Public Health (HZJZ), Krunoslav Capak, said on Wednesday that the number of new coronavirus cases in the first three days of this week was 30 percent higher than in the same period last week.

“There were 1,103 new cases of coronavirus in the period between Monday and Wednesday while last week there were 844 cases in the same period,” Capak said at a regular press conference of the national Covid-19 task force.

Currently the 14-day incidence rate per 100,000 population is 115.3 and Croatia continues to be in third place in the EU, with Finland and Denmark having a lower incidence rate.

The highest increase in the number of new cases has been registered in Dubrovnik-Neretva and Split-Dalmatia counties and Capak believes that that is because people have relaxed and socialize more.

The head of the national coronavirus task force, Davor Bozinovic, said that “talks had intensified” regarding the team’s decision on epidemiological restrictions after 1 March and that the increased numbers over the past five days as well as the 30 percent increase recorded this week would be taken into consideration.

“We still rank highly in the EU with regard to the incidence rate…. the situation is deteriorating in our eastern neighbours…” said Bozinovic, probably referring to Serbia which had a new spike in cases recently.

“There is still no information on the number of cases of the new British-identified strain of the coronavirus in Croatia, but that is because sequencing being conducted by the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control is slow,” the director of Zagreb’s infectious diseases hospital,  Alemka Markotic, said, adding that in most EU countries the new strain accounts for 20-70 percent of new infections.

“We need to be aware that it is certainly present in a higher percentage and we need to be cautious,” said Markotic.

Capak said that so far 184,076 vaccine doses had been used and that 125,771 people had been inoculated, with 58,305 having received both doses.

The HALMED medicines agency has received 991 reports of side effects, with 849 referring to the Pfizer vaccine, 52 to the Moderna vaccine and 88 to the AstraZeneca vaccine, he said.