75 nursing homes have been given a "status red" - meaning there is a significant risk to how they are operating.
The Health Service Executive (HSE) is currently supporting 425 long term residential care facilities affected by Covid-19.
Speaking about the status designations, the HSE's Chief Operations Officer, Anne O'Connor, said a major factor in designating a nursing home as "status red" is staffing levels and that nursing homes "would be where we [the HSE] have deployed the highest numbers of staff."
Ms O'Connor also warned that as testing is further implemented in nursing homes that more outbreaks of Covid-19 will be "inevitably" identified.
She said that the main challenge for the HSE then is to identify the nursing homes that "have a critical need for a high level of support."
Meanwhile, HSE chief Paul Reid has confirmed plans are being made to ramp up testing for Covid-19 to 100,000 tests a week.
He also said the deadly virus would be with the health system at least until next year and there was a need to plan for non-virus services for patients.
The “war-like response” by services would need be adapted to ensure other services are kept going, the HSE CEO explained.
Yesterday the HSE confirmed the deaths of 21 people in St Mary’s Hospital in Dublin since the outbreak of Covid-19.
