1,900 patients with Covid-19 symptoms discharged from Welsh hospitals

Around 1,900 people have been discharged from hospitals in Wales after being admitted with coronavirus symptoms according to NHS Wales' chief executive.

Dr Andrew Goodall told the daily Welsh Government briefing it should be “acknowledged and celebrated” and the figure showed “people can recover from this terrible virus."

He said a pattern was developing in Wales that showed a "stabilisation" in the number of cases, the need for intensive care beds and deaths.

Dr Andrew Goodall said the number of confirmed cases has stayed between 300 and 400 a day, while the number of deaths also appeared to be declining.

Public Health Wales announced on Thursday a further 17 people had died after testing positive for Covid-19, bringing the total number of deaths to 641.

There were also 234 new confirmed cases, with the total now at 8,358.

"These are encouraging signs reinforced by a pattern that is stronger over recent days," he said.

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"One of our concerns is that we have to continue with the range of mechanisms in place because given we have had such a significant impact in the way the public has worked with us, including staying at home, we have some concerns that what would happen is that we have a second or possibly even third peak.

"Our actions at this stage are to ensure we can keep things stable and improving but we will need to continue to work with the public at large."

Dr Goodall also things would not return to normal immediately after the coronavirus lockdown ended.

"We are part of a UK approach in terms of the mechanisms in place for the lockdown and we are still in that period for another couple of weeks," Dr Goodall said.

"If we assume that everything can return to normal because a lockdown date is finished, that cannot be the case.

"We are going to have to take a progressive approach on this.

"One of our worries about the development of the virus is that while we have got these encouraging signs at this stage we also need to make sure we don't allow it to reoccur, in particular to some of the peaks described."