The first corona patients who needed intensive care were registered during week 10 in the first half of March. Then the curve went steeply up and the country's hospitals had to expand the sites and cancel all unnecessary operations to power with.

About a month later, on April 12, over 500 covid patients were cared for at the country's IVA sites, which meant that in principle all of the 523 regular intensive care units were occupied only by corona patients.

"Extreme situation"

This was the situation for almost a month, and most of the patients were cared for at the end of April. It was only on May 8 that Taha Alexandersson, Deputy Emergency Response Manager at the National Board of Health, could tell that the figure had finally fallen below 500.

"Caring for 500 severely covid and other ill patients at IVA is an extreme situation for the healthcare staff," she said.

It only took a week before the same figure fell below 400 on May 15.

The curve has leveled out

Recently, the curve for intensive care has leveled off and has not gone down as quickly.

The number of newly admitted patients dropped to below 20 per day on May 13, from the peak of almost 50 patients for a few days in April. But since then, the number of new IVA patients has not decreased, but has been on average 17 to 19 per day for over three weeks.

So, it also took three weeks before the total number of IVA-treated people fell by another hundred.

"295 patients are treated in intensive care with a respirator with covid-19," said the National Board of Emergency Management's emergency preparedness manager Johanna Sandwall at today's press conference.

Yesterday's figure was 303 people.

Long care times

Another bright spot was that for the first time today, the National Board of Health and Welfare saw more green than red in its short-term situation.

The long hours of corona sickness are one of the reasons why the health care system has had such a heavy burden. The median time for those who have needed IVA care is 20 days according to the National Board of Health and Welfare. Some are taken care of for more than a month.

-

More statistics on intensive care covid patients can be found here