[ad_1]
As South Africa approaches the end of the so-called hard blockade, and with an expected increase in Covid-19 cases just around the corner, only 27 Covid-19 patients receive ventilation assistance in hospital, apparently online. with government projections.
Previous projections from the Health Department suggested that the country would need 7,000 ventilators by the time the maximum infection is supposed to hit the country, in September.
Professor Tulio de Oliveira, director of the KwaZulu-Natal Research and Innovation Sequencing Platform at the University of KwaZulu-Natal, says that number (27) is exactly in line with what would be expected, and is further proof of that SA’s decision to blockade the country when it did so was the correct one.
He explained that around 5% of people end up needing ventilators currently and it usually takes up to 14 days for a person to develop symptoms.
Until 14 days ago, the country had around 2,000 cases. So if you multiplied 2,000 cases by 5%, you would get around 100 cases. Taking the deaths into account, the figure of 27 is on target, de Oliveira explained.
But the situation would have been much worse if the government had not acted as it did. Without the hard blockade, the country could have expected a daily infection rate of around 33%, he said.
He said the blockade had given South Africa time to prepare for maximum infection, probably in two to three months, and likely rapid growth in Covid-19 cases.
The health system needed to be strengthened and protected, hence the acquisition of thousands of ventilators.
“A very important point is that once our hospitals are full of people in the ICU, people who would have survived from other things (like car accidents or other illnesses) end up dying, and that is what happened in the UK and Italy. They cannot receive more patients in the ICU than they would normally take. “
Fan shortages have pushed other healthcare systems around the world to the brink. As a result, a massive fan manufacturing and procurement campaign is underway in the country, in the form of the National Fan Project (NVP), which aims to ensure that the country has 10,000 fans by the end of June.
The health ministry revealed the number of patients on ventilation during a wide-ranging briefing for the portfolio health committee meeting on Monday morning.
According to the filing, 353 Covid-19 patients have been hospitalized across the country, with the majority, 143, in KwaZulu-Natal.
In addition to the 27 people with fans:
- 287 patients are in isolation rooms
- 24 are in high care
- 42 are in ICU
- 6 are in oxygen
Source: Department of Health (Click here for a larger version)
Health Minister Zweli Mkhize told the holding committee on Monday that the question of future need was based on what was seen around the world, in countries like the United States and Italy.
He said the understanding at the moment was that ventilators were currently available in public and private hospitals.
“We haven’t used that many yet,” he said.
Mkhize added that there were a number of fan production projects on the go.
According to a Quartz report, NVP aims to produce 1,500 fans locally in late May and 10,000 in late June. These are reportedly non-invasive ventilation units, and manufacturing is supposed to start in late April.
On Monday, Mkhize said the “general discussion” now was that there should be “less rush” to put people on intrusive fans, or whether non-intrusives should be used.
Peak infection concern
In a presentation to Parliament two weeks ago, the Health Department expressed concern about the lack of fans, News24 reported.
The department said the country would need 7,000 ventilators when the maximum infection is expected to hit the country, around September.
About half of that number is currently available in South Africa, the department said.
Without the blockade, the department estimated that the country would have reached the peak of infection in July.
According to that presentation:
- Currently there are only 3,318 critical care beds available, of which 2,140 are in private hospitals; There are 2,722 high-care beds in the country, of which only 1,082 are in the public sector; There are a total of 119,416 hospital beds available throughout South Africa.
- During maximum infection, in an optimistic scenario, and with forced closure, the maximum need for beds in intensive care units could exceed 14,700 beds at the highest level and 4,100 at the lowest level.
The government has not released its Covid-19 model, and scientists have warned that much is still unknown about SA’s response to the pandemic.
The government has launched a massive testing and detection campaign to try to get a better picture of the spread of the virus.
Limpopo screening
On Monday, the department said 5.8 million people had been screened for the disease, and 41,000 of those people had been referred for testing. As of Monday, 168,843 tests had been conducted.
The department’s presentation showed that the vast majority of screening tests were done in Limpopo, which is not a Covid-19 access point and has one of the lowest infection rates, with 2.6 million people screened to date. . Only 3,589 of those people were referred for testing.
In contrast, the Western Cape and Gauteng, with the highest number of infections, have examined 143,950 and 464,674 people, respectively, to date.
The national Health Department did not respond to requests for comment on the discrepancy, though News24 understands that Limpopo’s figures were a surprise to government experts.
A spokesman for Limpopo’s health department, Neil Shikambana, said it was unclear why the figure was so high, but two factors could play a role. He said Limpopo had 10,000 community health workers doing screening tests, compared to 28,000 nationwide.
In addition, Limpopo has the largest number of people living in formal housing in the country, according to Stats SA, so community health workers would not have to travel far to move from one dwelling to another, allowing them to examine more people, faster. said.
News24 asked the Department of Commerce and Industry (DTI), which manages the NVP, if the latest figures, the 27 ventilator patients, were in line with their modeling to justify the need to manufacture 10,000 units.
The DTI had not responded at the time of publication.
Similarly, the Health Department did not respond to requests for comment on the matter, and the National Institute of Communicable Diseases (NICD) referred questions to the department.
The South African Radio Astronomy Observatory (Sarao), which manages the NVP project on behalf of DTI, also referred questions to the department.
[ad_2]
