• ANGEL DÍAZ

    Madrid

Updated on Wednesday, 12January2022-16: 12

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  • Data The sixth wave could cause 15 million real infections: "We only detect between 20% and 30%"

Thanks to vaccines and the possibly milder omicron, it took a stratospheric number of infections to equalize the hospital pressure of last winter. But, in Spain, it has already happened. The mistake made by various authorities around the world, ours in a very clear way, has been to confuse a statistical notion, such as the rate, with reality, which is what health workers find every day. The percentage of disease is now lower, yes, but we have already used that wild card: ICUs are close to the highest level of risk.

If we compare the beginning of last winter with the current one, we see that the station began last year with more hospitalized Covid patients, but the figures have been equated. That is, the sixth wave of hospitalizations has practically reached the numbers that the third wave presented on these same dates, around Reyes. A year ago,

the pressure continued to rise until the end of January

, something that could also happen this time, although it is still too early to tell.

According to daily Health data, on December 21, 2020 there were a total of 11,431 people admitted, while, on the same day in 2021, there were 7,634, 33% less. However, the avalanche of infections in recent weeks has equalized the situation: yesterday there were

16,555 Covid patients admitted to Spain

, a figure very similar to that of a year ago, on January 11, 2021, when 16,792 were reported.

In addition, if we look at the number of admissions in the last 24 hours, the data for this course has been days above that of a year ago. Yesterday,

2,238 hospitalizations were reported on the day

, while on January 11, 2021 there were 1,800, almost 20% less. Keep in mind that the data is not yet consolidated, and it could take weeks to be consolidated. However, the daily Health reports make it possible to compare the figures reported a year ago with those reported today.

The result is that both waves, although very different in terms of the number of cases, are not so different in hospitals. The advantage that vaccination gave us has been negatively offset by the millions of infections suffered. “The infection rate leads to fewer hospitalized patients and fewer ICU patients. But, as it has increased so much, even above the first wave,

in the end there are many admissions to the hospital and many admissions to the ICU

", explains María Cruz Martín, president of the Pan-American Federation of Intensive Medicine.

A year ago, the percentage of beds occupied by Covid patients was 13.77%, compared to 13.34% yesterday. In ICUs, where the maximum risk threshold is at 25%, last year that level had just been exceeded (26.13%), while now we are about to do so (23.50%). At the peak of the third wave in ICUs, already in February, 5,000 intensive care patients were reached. Now they are 2,200; and a year ago, 2,511. It is difficult to anticipate how far the current wave could grow. "We are not yet at the peak moment," Dr. Cruz advances. “I don't know when it will arrive, but we have not started to descend.

We can reach the third week of January with complications

, "he weighs. "We can go back to being like in the third wave."

One difference with respect to previous waves is that there is now a "new profile" of patient who,

although positive for SARS-CoV-2, has not been admitted for that reason

.

In this sense, the direct ravages of the infection would be less than those reflected in the figures, although these infections also increase the pressure on hospitals.

"They complicate management, because they are patients who have to be isolated," recalls Martín, who highlights that vaccination is clearly being noticed in ICUs: "The high percentage of vaccination that we have means that we are not like in the worst moments », Reels.

If it weren't for vaccines, he adds, "we would probably be the same as in February or March 2020."

Primary and Emergency, on the brink of collapse

The hundreds of thousands of cases that have been registered in recent days have pushed Primary Care to the limit and,

with it, the entire health system

.

"Now, clearly, the most affected is Primary Care," says Dr. Cruz, adding: "When the Primary Care system does not have the capacity to respond, due to saturation, this

results in the Emergency Department

."

Until now, the hospitalization had been "perhaps less saturated", but it has also had to attend to patients who,

normally, would have solved their problem in Primary

.

To which is added that, in recent weeks, hospitals are also filling up.

"

Little by little, you see that more and more intensive care beds are occupied

," he says.

«I do not want negative or pessimistic, but the health system needs a boost, a reinforcement.

It has been very worn in every way.

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