The Minister of Health sent Mangarov to lead the battle against Covid-19

Health Minister Kostadin Angelov has asked infectious disease specialist Assistant Professor Atanas Mangarov, a leading critic of state measures against coronavirus, to lead the fight against the disease at the Infectious Diseases Hospital. This was announced by Angelov during his visit to the hospital, where the emergency coordination center in Sofia is located.

As of yesterday, Adjunct Professor Mangarov has been appointed head of the clinic where all coronavirus patients are treated at the Hospital for Infectious Diseases, Angelov announced.

“It is very important that all doctors get involved in the fight for the treatment of the coronavirus. Yesterday I had a conversation with Associate Professor Mangarov and asked him personally to get involved. He is engaged and has an order for the head of the clinic where it is they treat all patients with coronavirus. The responsibility for the treatment of these patients will be theirs, side by side with colleagues who are in the territory of the Hospital for Infectious Diseases, “said the minister.

The director of the hospital, Prof. Dr. Tatiana Chervenyakova, clarified that yesterday Mangarov himself presented a request for reassignment with the argument that at this moment the flow to the children’s clinic where he works is less.

“I asked for it myself, because things need to change a bit in terms of treatment, length of stay, isolation and preventive measures,” Prof. Mangarov commented.

“It’s just that all these veiled measures are practically useless. Here we have to act in the same way that we do with any new respiratory infection. The closest example of that is the way we act when there was an epidemic of” Swine Flu. It should be no different. I will follow all the rules that are imposed there, but I will try to change them a little from the inside, “he added.

The Hospital for Infectious Diseases has 120 beds, 80 of which are reserved for the treatment of Covid-19. 70 of the seats are already taken and the Covid room is expected to expand with 10 more beds on the third floor in the coming days.

Associate Professor Mangarov is one of the main critics of the global and Bulgarian response to the pandemic, having repeatedly said that it is a common virus, that patients are not treated, but simply pass that wearing masks does not make sense. He himself claims that he has been working with the infected without a mask and that he has been wearing a mask on public transport since March. His other statements are that the Italian scenario is impossible in our country because there is not such an old population and that the coronavirus will disappear in summer. Many of his predictions and expectations were not fulfilled, but his alternatives won many followers, which is why his fellow doctors and part of society blame him for the severe consequences of the epidemic in our country.

ABV is scheduled to protest this evening in front of the Health Ministry against the inadequate state response to the epidemic, which was initially announced that Mangarov would attend, but given his new appointment, it is unclear if this will happen.