Pointe-a-Pitre (AFP)
An epidemic focus of nearly 20 people, patients and staff members who tested positive for Covid-19, was identified this week in the geriatric service of the CHU de Guadeloupe, we learned from hospital sources.
"Everything went very quickly, but the situation has stabilized for almost 24 hours," Professor Maturin Tabue Teguo, head of the geriatrics department at the CHU, told AFP on Friday, confirming information from RCI Guadeloupe.
"We had the first two cases on Monday, a very rapid rise, and late Thursday morning there were 10 cases" among the 19 patients hospitalized in this 22-bed department, he said, adding to that " eight contaminated staff "or" a good quarter of the staff ", while other tests were still underway for them.
"It happened from the outside", assures the doctor, for whom "one cannot know", but which evokes "the relaxation of the measures by the visitors. The virus arrived in multiple rooms with two or four patients but not in rooms with only one patient ".
"We are gradually emptying the service, with 13 patients still hospitalized", but some "who were already at the end of their life" must remain hospitalized, as well as those who, diagnosed positive, present symptoms, also indicated Mr. Tabue Teguo.
Visits are authorized "on a case-by-case basis" and a disinfection of the service could take place "in the middle of next week".
The CHSCT dispatched one of its members to the service on Friday.
"We cannot treat sick people with a sick person, our CHU is a big patient", denounced Gaby Clavier, UTS UGTG union representative at the CHU, evoking "a generally unhealthy establishment", "a lack of staff and resources" and "a physically and mentally tired staff".
"More than 20% of CHU staff have tested positive since the start of the crisis," according to the same source.
The dilapidated establishment must be replaced by a new hospital, currently under construction in Les Abymes, and scheduled for delivery in 2023.
cre / etr / ib / dch
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