Health Minister Vili Beros said at a government session on Thursday that the number of new coronavirus infections was down 14.5% from the previous week and that the number of hospitalizations was also slightly smaller even though pressure on the health system was still significant.

The test positivity rate in the past 24 hours was 38.35%, a drop of 14.5% compared to last week and of 26.5% compared to two weeks ago. A total of 2,391 people are hospitalized, which is a slight decrease. In the past 24 hours 30 people were put on ventilators and 24 of them are unvaccinated, said Beros.

Despite the decline in the number of infections, hospitals are still under strain and the situation is most difficult in the northwest of Croatia, in the hospitals in Zabok, Varazdin, Cakovec and Koprivnica, where nurses and ventilators from other health institutions are being sent.

“The capacity for the admission of Covid-19 patients keeps increasing, and over the past month the number of beds for those patients was increased from 2,253 to 3,580, which is currently insufficient. The number of hospitalizations in that period grew by 85 percent, from 1,330 to 2,545,” he said.

As for the new coronavirus variant Omicron, the minister said that it was considered more dangerous because it had twice as many mutations as the Delta variant. However, experts note that vaccines continue to provide a high degree of protection from severe clinical symptoms and hospitalization, he said.

A total of 209,000 people have received the third vaccine dose so far.

As for vaccination with the first and second doses, one should strive to achieve the vaccination rate of Zagreb (75 percent), with the 70-74 age group having the highest vaccination rate, with 90 percent having received at least one shot.