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Despite the increase in the number of infections, fewer and fewer intensive hospital beds are being kept in Germany for people seriously ill with the new type of coronavirus. The Baden-Württemberg state government this week ordered that in hospitals, instead of the current 35 percent, only 10 percent of intensive care units be kept for severe cases of the disease caused by the virus.
The province, with a population of 11 million, is adopting a long-standing practice in many parts of the country. In the provincial capital Berlin, for example, the proportion of beds reserved for patients in need of care due to a coronavirus epidemic has been 10 percent in intensive care units since June, and in Lower Saxony since mid-July. Bavaria and Brandenburg had not had that quota since early summer. It was abolished in Hamburg in August and in Saxony-Anhalt in early September.
The first wave peaked in early April, when approximately 6,000 new infections were recorded daily and more than 200 died from the Covid-19 disease daily. Then the epidemic subsided for about three months. In recent weeks, the virus has spread faster again, with the number of new cases per day crossing the 2,000 mark twice in the past four days, while the number of people needing intensive hospital treatment and deaths are still only a fraction of what was recorded during the spring wave.
According to the latest data on Saturday from the Professional Organization for Intensive Care and Accident Care (DIVI), of the approximately 30,000 intensive care units operated across the country, only 257 beds treat patients with Covid-19.
(MTI)
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