The HSE has given a number of examples of how easily COVID-19 can spread among households.

At tonight's NPHET press briefing, Dr Mai Mannix - Director of Public Health Mid-West - gave several examples of outbreaks in the Mid-West region (which covers Limerick, Clare and north Tipperary) in recent weeks.

Dr Mannix said one multi-household community outbreak was 'basically what happens when people visit each other for cups of tea, a beer or even a chat' and don't adhere to social distancing or mask-wearing.

There was at least 20 cases across six households, due to mixing between the households.

One of the households also brought the virus into a workplace, causing five cases there.

One person in that workplace also brought the virus home, leading to another family outbreak.

A second example showed a 'chain of transmission' related to a funeral outbreak.

Dr Mannix said they'd seen a number of funeral outbreaks across all three counties in their region recently.

She said it's been a very difficult time for grieving people over the past year, but it's still vital to be very careful at funerals.

A third example, meanwhile, indicated there were at least 40 staff cases in a large workplace outbreak.

In that case, there were a 'significant number' of staff not wearing masks, and some 'slippage' in social distancing when it came to the likes of smoking breaks.

Dr Mannix said during break times people often 'relax and forget they still need to social distance'.

She warned that the third wave has seen outbreaks in workplaces that hadn't previously seen outbreaks - potentially a result of the more transmissible strain of the virus that's now dominant in the country.