Austria reported on Wednesday more than 2,000 new coronavirus infections in the past 24 hours, the first time in almost five weeks, according to data from the Ministry of Interior.

The 2,006 new cases brought the tally of infections to 450,376, while 37 new deaths took the toll to 8,470 in the Alpine country, the data showed.

Health Minister Rudolf Anschober told the Austrian Press Agency (APA) on Wednesday that further tightening is inevitable if there were "very strong uncontrolled increases" in the next few weeks.

He noted that it is not clear whether the increase of infection numbers reflects the spread of the mutations or more tests being carried out.

"The increasing reproduction rate is one of our major concerns," said the minister.

According to data published last Friday by the Austrian Agency for Health and Food Safety (AGES), the reproduction rate was 1.04 and thus well above the critical value of 1.

Anschober explained that the spread in Austria of the mutations first identified in the UK and South Africa would "increase the pressure on the infection situation", as the variants are 30 to 40 percent more infectious.

The minister did not rule out the possibility of a third wave of the pandemic, emphasising that the phase up to Easter will be "difficult and risky".

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