The 44 patients now admitted to hospital with Covid-19 in Norway is an increase by 8 since Wednesday, news wire NTB reports.

It is also the highest number of hospitalisations since May 22nd, when the figure stood at 45.

Four patients are currently receiving ventilator treatment, according to the Norwegian Directorate of Health’s official count. That is an increase by two since yesterday.

“We have seen an increase in infection numbers in Norway since August, but until now the infections have primarily been in young people. We are now seeing that the virus is spreading to older people and we are therefore getting more hospitalisations,” the Directorate of Health’s assistant director Espen Nakstad told NTB.

“If infections continue to increase, there is a risk that the number of hospital admissions will also increase going forward,” he added.

New infections in Norway are mostly being caused by poor compliance with quarantine requirements, the assistant health director said.

“We must work harder to reach out to the groups who are contributing most to the spread of infections,” Nakstad said.

Young people and business travellers are particularly prominent groups in this regard, he said.

“It is possible that we are seeing an autumn holiday effect on infection rates which come from people holidaying in home countries outside of Norway,” he added.

The hospitalisations are not evenly distributed across the country, NTB reports.

Of the patients in hospital with Covid-19 as of Thursday, 31 are in the Southern and Eastern Norway Regional Health Authority (RHF), which includes Oslo.

Seven are in Western Norway Regional Health Authority RHF, two in Central Norway RHF and four in Northern Norway RHF.

Norway has registered 279 coronavirus-related deaths since the beginning of the pandemic. 192 new cases of the virus were reported in the most recent daily update.

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