Slovenian health authorities on Sunday reported 1,478 new coronavirus infections, which is less than on the previous day and better than a week ago, with the number of hospitalisations expected to start to drop in the coming week as well.

Of 3,402 tested persons, results for 1,478 came back positive in the last 24 hours, which is a 43.4% positivity rate, while seven days ago 2,245 new cases were identified, with almost every other test being positive.

The number of active cases on Sunday dropped to 39,165, the seven-day average of daily infections dropped to 2,381 and the 14-day incidence to 1,859, the national public health institute said.

The epidemiological situation has been calming slightly for more than a week, and the number of hospitalisations has reached its peak and is expected to start declining.

Janez Zibert, a professor at the Ljubljana School of Medicine, has noted that the situation is not stable since only slightly more than 54% of the population has been inoculated, and as many as half a million people have neither got infected nor immunised. A vaccination rate of at least 75% would provide more security in the population and health system for the dominant Delta coronavirus variant, he said.