Two new coronavirus cases were detected from almost 1,200 tests conducted over the past day, bringing Malta’s total number of COVID-19 cases up to 467.

Sixteen further patients have recovered, 96 patients remain in care and four have died.

One of the two new cases concerns a Gozitan man who tested positive following random testing. The second case identified overnight is of a male resident at the Ħal Far open centre, which remains under lockdown.

Both the newly-identified cases were asymptomatic.      

Health Minister Chris Fearne revealed the two new cases during a news conference held to announce a relaxation of measures introduced to contain the virus outbreak.

The decision to relax measures was taken after epidemiologists noted that the coronavirus’ reproduction number had remained consistently below 1.0 for the past two weeks, Fearne said.

A reproduction number indicates how many people, on average, an infected person passes the virus to. An R-factor below 1.0 means the virus is being gradually snuffed out.

Fearne warned: “If the R factor rises above 1.0 and remains there, we may have to go back."

The daily number of new coronavirus cases has been consistently low for the past two weeks, remaining in single digits on all but one occasion.