Roman Prymula, the Minister of Health, told journalists that the capacity of beds with ventilators is almost reached at Prague hospitals, Lidovky.cz reports. He added that hospitals will need to expand its capacities to accommodate more patients with COVID-19. That might require some surgeries and treatments to be postponed according to Vinegret.cz, but the government is working towards avoiding that scenario.
“We want to remove the barrier between COVID and Non-COVID beds…but I would not like to see that someone who requires acute care cannot receive a ventilator, because there are be COVID patients everywhere,” Prymula said.
The government will work towards creating the capacity in such a way that doesn’t hurt those currently undergoing treatment.
The situation is especially complicated because of the high number of infections among the hospital staff. According to the data reported by Lidovky.cz, as of September 19, there were 259 doctors who had tested positive for COVID-19 in comparison with four just a month earlier. The same situation is with nurses – over the same period, the number of infected went from three to 433.
There are already 28,933 active cases in the Czech Republic – the number has already exceeded the number of those recovered. The country sees an average of 2000 more cases each day with the worst situation being in Prague.
