[ad_1]
Florence, October 22, 2020 – The greatest fear in the contagion of covid is the possible saturation or worsening of the burden of patients in hospitals, with the consequent inefficiencies for the rest of patients. These are the words of Dr. Fabio Voller, coordinator of the Ars Toscana Centro epidemiology observatory.
Dr. Voller What happened in the last twenty days?
It is clear to everyone that in the last two and a half weeks the epidemiological panorama has definitely changed, in Tuscany as in other Italian regions. After the exponential increase in cases, we now have a similar exponential increase in hospitalizations. Fortunately, this increase for now does not put in difficulty neither the extraordinary hospitalizations, nor especially the intensive therapies that are growing in a less decisive way. However, it must be said that the absorption of the covid demand is making the organization of our hospitals quite difficult, forcing them to quickly reconvert. But knowing that we had to reabsorb all the additional demand for covid that had accumulated in the previous months, starting from the period of the blockade. This is, therefore, the most critical moment for the organization, especially with regard to hospital itineraries. On the other hand, once the two hundred daily cases were exceeded, the entire tracking chain suffered great pain, which had worked very well so far, allowing us to identify and isolate positives promptly. Nowadays it is also difficult to recover the data to be analyzed, since it is the same operators that make the swabs that must be behind all the bureaucratic aspect: cures, quarantine notifications, isolation, etc.
Lack of staff, facilities, materials or what else?
From the point of view of the laboratories it is working well and the buffers are growing progressively. We have problems at the territorial level. We had to plan better. I don’t like to say ‘we’ told them ‘, but since June we have highlighted some critical issues that could have occurred and in which it was necessary to intervene. Evidently not enough has been done. We are working on many things now, but it is clear that they have accumulated a delay that becomes an objective difficulty.
Has the type of hospitalization changed?
Patient conditions are getting a little more serious again, we still don’t have a significant number of interstitial pneumonia yet, but a good number of patients need supportive therapies like drugs and oxygen. There is still a good proportion of hospitalized people who could be diverted to low-care facilities or health hotels, and this must be done quickly to ease the hospital system in this difficult phase.
What about intensive care?
The upward curve was expected because the historical series tell us that as of September mortality increases after 65 years of age and even earlier the need for intensive care grows. What comforts us a bit is the fact that, as mentioned, IT still does not grow in the same progression as infected and hospitalizations. We also know that we can offer a lot of intensive care, so we are pretty calm. However, we also know that this will be detrimental for other situations related to non-covid medical cases.
What to do?
We must continue to do what we are doing these days: be as careful as possible, masks where they are needed, distances, avoid crowds, wash hands frequently. These are the first defenses against contagion. However, it must be said that DPCMs are not helping us much …
Why?
I have the impression that measures are taken at secondary points and critical points in the system, such as the question of transport, are not decisively addressed. Obviously, we cannot certify it with the data, but it is clear that having brought the LPT capacity to 80, without the possibility of real control, has had a substantial impact on the advance of the epidemic.
© All rights reserved
