hereOnly 'essential' shops will remain open.A full announcement is expected later.The Republic of Ireland has a different system to the UK, instead of a three tier system, the government has five different levels of alert.Cabinet ministers agreed to place the country into level five, the harshest restrictions, during a meeting this evening.Level five will remain in place until December 1.The decision came as a further 1,031 cases of coronavirus were confirmed by the country's National Public Health Emergency Team.As of Monday afternoon, 298 people were in hospital suffering from the virus, including 34 people in intensive care.Of the new cases, 235 were in Dublin, 232 in Cork, 60 in Galway, 47 in Limerick, 47 in Kerry, and the remaining 410.