Rome, Feb 9 Italy's main coronavirus indicators have continued to improve, even after a week into the country's latest easing of health restrictions and despite a slowdown in vaccine rollout.
According to the Health Ministry, the country registered 7,970 new cases on Monday, the second time that the single-day figure was under 8,000 in a week and a level not seen since October 2020, reports Xinhua news agency.
Based on the seven-day moving average, the number of new infections has been on an overall decline since peaking at nearly 40,000 in November 2020.
The Ministry said there were 307 additional coronavirus deaths also in the last 24 hours, a slight increase from 270 a day earlier but still the third-lowest daily count this year.
With the new infections and fatalities, the country's overall caseload and death toll currently stood at 2,644,707 and 91,580, respectively.
Meanwhile, there were more than 15,000 recoveries reported on Monday, nearly double the number of new cases, bringing the total number of active cases below 420,000 for the first time since November 3, 2020.
The last time recoveries failed to outnumber newly reported cases was in mid-November.
But one of the main indicators, the number of patients in intensive care units, remained stubbornly high.
There were 2,143 such cases on Monday, an increase of 36 compared to Sunday.
Monday's number was down by just 145 compared to 10 days ago and 401 fewer than 20 days ago.
On Monday, virologist Fabrizio Pregliasco called the overall situation in Italy "essentially stable" and said that if that continues, restaurants might reopen in the evenings for the first time in months, at least in low-impact regions.
The developments come after the country's easing of health restrictions in most regions from January 31.
A further easing for some regions went into effect Monday.
One of the regions where the tight curbs still remain is Umbria, which was not hit particularly hard by the earlier waves of the pandemic, but it is now reporting a new hospitalisation every hour, according to local media.
Italy's vaccine rollout continues to lag behind its goals due to delivery shortfalls from vaccine makers.
According to calculations from the Hume Foundation and the news agency ANSA, if the current pace of immunizations does not speed up, Italy will not achieve herd immunity before August 2023.
( With inputs from IANS )
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