For the third day in a row, Upper Austria set a record with 8,552 new infections within 24 hours on Friday. The rapid spread of the omicron variant BA.2 brings new onerous challenges for hospitals in general, despite the fact that it is less dangerous. Patients who have tested positive are spread across different departments in the hospital, since this infection is often only a “side finding,” said Linz pulmonary specialist Bernd Lamprecht.
Video: After the obligation to vaccinate is to be suspended, doctors are warning of the fall. Because the immunity also decreases in those who have recovered and those who have been vaccinated. As reported, the range of vaccinations and tests is also to be reduced – although the new infections exploded on Wednesday.
Improvement not expected until April
In the Innsbruck University Hospital, he found out in a phone call that 13 departments had been confronted with Corona this week, although the patients were being treated in hospital because of other symptoms. The associated increased hygiene measures mean a further burden in everyday clinical practice. In addition, there is currently the fact that more and more staff are absent due to illness. According to the Corona expert, it is currently eight percent in Upper Austria. The interaction of these two factors leads to a “high load on the normal wards”, which, according to forecasts, will last longer than expected, until April.
Back to “crisis mode”
The medical director of the Salzkammergut Klinikum Tilmann Königswieser, who is also on the state’s crisis team, had already spoken of a “kind of crisis mode” on Thursday, which is why individual hospitals would only carry out acute interventions again. Lamprecht sees this “crisis mode” mainly because there is currently a clear discrepancy between the “apparent normality” with the elimination of restrictions outside the hospitals on March 5 and the “high burden” in the hospitals. The pulmonary specialist advocates that “consideration of the normal wards” should be a determining parameter when assessing the situation.
The doctor expects “no success” from the reintroduction of preventive measures for the population, as proposed by the Corona Commission on Thursday. With the suspension of the obligation to vaccinate, it was signaled that “it would be possible to do without strict measures”. He therefore appealed to personal responsibility and z. B to wear FFP2 masks where this is not mandatory.
Source: Nachrichten
