“Two days ago we had a record of tests for covid-19: more than 94 thousand tests. I recall that, in early March 2020, we had just over two thousand tests. We reached ten million tests today, in round numbers, and we do more than 970 thousand tests per million inhabitants”said António Sales, after the inauguration of the expansion of the Gastroenterology and Pneumology outpatient units of the Hospital de Santo André, a unit of the Center Hospital of Leiria.

The official explained that the mass testing has nothing to do with an increase in the incidence of Covid-19 in Portugal, but is instead because the country is “better able to face the problem head on” and it is necessary to “test to find” positive cases.

António Sales also stressed that “over 180 thousand people” were vaccinated during the weekend.

“It is a real test of our ability to plan and organise.”