The total number of corona patients in hospitals will most likely rise to more than 3,200 in the next two weeks. Ernst Kuipers, chairman of the National Acute Care Network (LNAZ), said in the House of Representatives on Tuesday. Now hospitals are treating more than 2,800 people because of Covid-19, the disease caused by the corona virus.
Chris van Mersbergen
Latest update:
10:44
The National Coordination Center for Patient Distribution (LCPS) calculated three scenarios. In the most favorable picture, the number of corona patients in the nursing wards will rise from more than 2,200 now to 2,430 in mid-December. In that case, the intensive care units would care for about 780 people, compared to about 600 now. This would mean that a total of 3,210 hospital beds would be occupied by people with Covid-19.
If the current growth continues, a slightly less favorable scenario, the total number of admitted patients will rise in the coming weeks to approximately 3700, according to Kuipers, of whom about 900 are in intensive care units. In the worst-case scenario, if the influx increases, the number of corona patients in hospitals could rise to almost 4,500.
Code black
When asked by PVV MP Fleur Agema when the breaking point to code black is approaching, where not every patient can receive more hospital care, Kuipers kept quiet. “We are already in a gray area, in which you postpone care for other patients. We will increase the IC capacity required in proportion to the flow of corona patients. You do it with less staff, and deploy employees in a different way or other departments.”
Kuipers expects that the latest corona measures will help to reduce the reproduction number of the virus to below 1. In that case, the number of new cases would gradually decrease. In the long run, fewer patients would end up in hospitals.
The care boss called the flattening of the number of positive corona tests in our country a ‘first bright spot, but no more than that’. “We have a number of patients in hospitals that are just as high as last winter. And then we are just at the beginning of winter. In addition, the mortgage we have on other care that still has to be caught up is much larger. So we are really not there yet.”
Kuipers hopes that at some point a ‘calm situation’ can be achieved. “That almost everyone has built up immunity because they have been vaccinated, boosted or cured.”
Almost half unvaccinated
Almost half of the corona patients in hospital, 49 percent, have not been vaccinated, Ernst Kuipers, chairman of the National Network Acute Care (LNAZ), said in the House of Representatives this morning. Two-thirds of those who have not been vaccinated in the hospital are under the age of 70.
Only 27 percent of those who have been vaccinated in hospital are younger than 70, Kuipers said. Just under 20 percent of the corona patients in the hospital had no underlying disease or an immune disorder. This is about 55 percent of the unvaccinated. About one-eighth of the Dutch population over the age of 12 has not been vaccinated or cured.
Looking at intensive care, the ratio is ‘much more skewed’, says Kuipers. “There, 75 percent of the corona patients come from that group of one eighth who has not been vaccinated or cured.”
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