Vienna. On National Day, Chancellor Sebastian Kurz warned: “The last measure is a second lockdown. This will be necessary when intensive care is overburdened because of corona cases.
“Sharpening up”. On Tuesday, the office of the Green Minister of Health, Rudolf Anschober, also warned: “If these infection figures continue to develop as dynamically as they did last week, the situation could quickly escalate.
Experts explain: Under normal conditions, i.e. without corona, 85 to 90 % of intensive care beds are occupied. So there is not that much space available for Covid emergencies. Scheduled operations must now be postponed again (for example in Upper Austria) to make room.
Austrian daily newspaper “Österreich” researched the situation in the hospitals.
Distribution. The number of intensive care patients rose from 188 to 203 (+8 %) in one day. The 7-day comparison shows an increase of 40%. According to AGES, 651 intensive care beds are available for corona patients nationwide. But these are unequally distributed.
Styria. “Smaller hospitals are already reaching their limits,” says the Steiermärkische Krankenanstaltengesellschaft. In the last five days, the number of corona patients here has risen by 70. If it continues like this, it will take 25 days until all corona beds in the whole country are full. In the LKH Weiz all normal and intensive care beds are already occupied. Patients are being transferred to other hospitals – it is still possible.
Salzburg. In Salzburg the situation is even more urgent. The hospitals are already overloaded in one week, says VP-Landeshauptmann Wilfried Haslauer. The number of corona patients here doubled within six days.
Increase in patients: Plus 80% in one day
Vorarlberg. An “emergency call” also comes from Vorarlberg, the situation is critical. Within one day the number of patients increased by 80 % on normal wards.
Upper Austria. In Upper Austria a bottleneck is expected rather with the personnel.
Vienna. Even in Vienna a quarter of the intensive care beds are occupied.
“If the numbers continue to rise like this, a lockdown is possible in just one month,” Virologist Norbert Nowotny told “Österreich”.
Salzburg. Alarm number two from Salzburg: Contact Tracing can currently only run in emergency mode. One of 40 employees has tested positive. As of now, 20 of her colleagues must therefore be quarantined. “We’ll do what we can,” says Karl Schupfer, spokesman for the city of Salzburg.
“Not create”. What is still possible: All those who have tested positive are contacted and isolated. Category 1 contact persons (direct contact) are researched as best as possible. But further contacts “will probably not be possible at the moment”, says Schupfer.
— hp with reports from oe24.at. Picture: stockilyapp.com
This post has already been read 929 times!