Coronavirus: caregivers in Romania cry out in anger

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In Romania, medical personnel denounce a glaring lack of means to deal with the epidemic. As a result, many doctors and hospital staff have already fallen ill.

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The great hospital center of Suceava, in the north, was the pride of Romania recently. This complex, modernized with European funds, had been set up as an example by President Klaus Iohannis. But today is no longer the time for praise, since nearly 200 staff members, including more than 40 doctors, were infected with the coronavirus there. The hospital manager was dismissed, a negligence investigation opened, and the facility closed for 48 hours for disinfection.

The management of the hospital center is justified by saying that it is faced with a lack of protective equipment. But the case of Sucaeva is not isolated: other hospitals are facing the same problem, raising fears of a shortage of medical personnel, increasingly worried. Petitions are circulating on the internet, nurses are unleashing their anger on social networks.

“ We are sent to death with bare hands. We have two coveralls for twelve employees, ”said anesthesiologist Lorena Ehim, head of the intensive care department at Orastie hospital in the center of the country. She resigned, as did several nurses. Of the 2,450 cases of Covid-19 diagnosed in Romania, almost 300 concern members of the medical staff.

Underfunded, the public health sector also faces a shortage of doctors. Since Romania's entry into the European Union in 2007, around a quarter of Romanian practitioners have settled in Western Europe.

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