The number of people travelling beyond 10km of their home reached its highest level since the pandemic began on the week ending December 24th.
According to the Central Statistics Office (CSO) Staying Local Indicator, only 51 per cent of people remained within 10km of their home each day between December 18th and 24th. This figure increased to 58 per cent the following week.
The highest rate of people staying within their home's 10km radius was noted during the first wave of the virus, when 76.7 per cent of the population stayed local each day during the week ending April 15th.
The number of people staying close to home was not as high throughout the second wave of the virus towards the end of October, which may be due to schools remaining open and more businesses and service providers being deemed essential.
During this period, the largest volume (62.9 per cent) of people remaining within their 10km was noted during the week ending November 4th.
The availability of service close-by was a factor in peoples' ability to stay within 10km of their homes, with higher compliance recorded in urban areas, as senior statistician John Dunne explains:
"Propensity to stay within 10km of residence tends to differ by county, as movement is impacted by local circumstances and conditions, such as access to services and levels of urbanisation.
"For example, Dublin, with a high level of urbanisation, consistently shows the highest percentage of persons staying local, while Roscommon and Mayo, with low levels of urbanisation, have the lowest percentage of persons staying within 10km of home."
According to the CSO's data, Dublin had the highest number (66 per cent) of people staying within their 10km zone during the week ending December 31st, while Galway (48.7 per cent), Mayo (48.2 per cent) and Sligo (49.8 per cent) had among the lowest rate of people staying close to home.
