In the past 24 hours another seven people died in Slovenia as a consequence of COVID-19 and 1,112 new cases were registered, the largest number in the past two weeks, the country's government said on Wednesday.

A total of 5,989 PCR tests were conducted in that period and almost 19% returned positive.

There are currently 444 COVID patients in hospitals and 83 are in intensive care, the Health Ministry said.

Prime Minister Janez Janša once again warned of the reality of a third wave of the epidemic. Slovenia is still in the orange zone so there will not be any further relaxing of restrictions, local media said.

The number of hospitalised patients is continuing to slowly decrease, but the number of active cases is not and there are currently 10,310 active cases in the country.

The death toll in Slovenia since the outbreak of the epidemic now stands at 3,948 and the average daily count of new cases is 742, the Health Ministry said.

The Public Health Institute said that so far 8.4% of the population have been inoculated against the virus and 4.1% have received both shots of vaccine.

Of the 18 cases of adverse effects from vaccination, 17 are related to the Pfizer vaccine and 1 case to AstraZeneca's, but the fewest number of people have been inoculated with AstraZeneca's vaccine because it was approved last, the Health Ministry said.