While the momentum of the '3rd pandemic' of Corona 19 is not steadily declining, deaths from group infections are continuing in nursing facilities nationwide with many high-risk confirmed cases.
Many of these are elderly seniors with underlying diseases, and they die in quarantine in nursing hospitals without being assigned a dedicated bed, and the quarantine authorities are in an urgent situation.
According to the Central Defense Response Headquarters today (29th) and each city/province, 57 people died after the corona19 diagnosis in nursing hospitals or nursing facilities after January this year, or as of yesterday.
In particular, the situation at Hyoplus Nursing Hospital in Bucheon, Gyeonggi Province, where more than 160 confirmed patients, including medical staff and residents, are serious.
On the 13th of this month, the cumulative death toll has increased to 38 after the first death in this nursing hospital.
The situation at other nursing homes and nursing homes nationwide is not very different.
In Ulsan Yangjiyoyang Hospital, 24 out of 167 residents who were confirmed confirmed died, and 7 out of 67 confirmed residents at the True Love Elderly Nursing Home in Cheongju, Chungcheongbuk-do.
Related confirmed cases from these nursing homes are also rising like a snowball.
As of the last 27 days ▲ Guro-gu nursing home in Seoul-nursing home cumulative 136 people ▲ Hyoplus nursing hospital in Bucheon-si, Gyeonggi-do 164 people ▲ Canaan nursing home in Gimje-si, Jeonbuk, 91 people ▲ True love elderly nursing home in Cheongju-si, Chungbuk 105 people ▲ Large-scale group infection, including 243 nursing hospitals in Nam-gu, Ulsan It's happening all over the country.
Kang Young-seok, head of the Jeonbuk-do health care department, said, "The nursing hospitals are highly concentrated because many patients are hospitalized. Because most of them are elderly patients, their immunity is also low."
The problem is that the number of severely ill patients' beds has become scarce due to the overlapping of a nursing home-initiated group infection and a nationwide tertiary pandemic, and deaths continue to appear due to not receiving timely treatment.
Of the 38 deaths of the Bucheon Hyoplus Nursing Hospital, 27 died while waiting for a dedicated bed assignment.
Today in this nursing hospital, 31 people, including 21 confirmed residents and 10 medical staff, are waiting for a dedicated bed assignment, but there is no room for severely ill patients in the metropolitan area, so the possibility of continued deaths cannot be ruled out.
From the 6th of this month, even at the Ulsan Yangjiyoyang Hospital, which was quarantined in a cohort (same group), 5 of the 24 dead died without being assigned a dedicated bed.
This nursing hospital was also unable to immediately transfer confirmed patients who tested positive among hospitalized patients at the beginning of the outbreak.
This is because the Ulsan University Hospital, the only base hospital in the Ulsan region, also did not have enough beds.
Even if I tried to move to a medical facility in another area nearby, the majority of the confirmed patients were elderly, had underlying diseases, and were unable to transport long distances because they were'continental patients' who live mainly in bed.
While managing the confirmed and non-confirmed patients together, if there is an extra bed due to a discharge from the Ulsan University Hospital, the situation is to transfer the patients with serious conditions first.
The quarantine authorities also promoted a plan to move non-confirmed people to external private hospitals instead of confirmed patients who are difficult to secure beds, but it was finally destroyed.
Finally, the Korean Medical Association urged the government to lift the cohort quarantine and promptly transfer the patients to a dedicated bed, saying that the cohort quarantine of nursing hospitals is worsening the patient's condition.
The medical association held a press conference today at Bucheon Hyoplus Nursing Hospital and emphasized that "Cohort isolation is ultimately due to the shortage of beds, so the government must do its best to secure corona19-only hospitals and beds so that patients can be transferred quickly." .
As such cases of elderly patients dying because they are not assigned a bed in a timely manner, public opinion is growing, urging to prepare special measures.
On the Blue House National Petition bulletin board yesterday,'Please rescue patients in nursing hospitals who are quarantined and confined like Japanese cruise ships and dying' posted a message yesterday.
The author, who said that he is a medical staff working at a nursing hospital in Seoul, where the cohort is currently being quarantined, said, "If the existing nursing personnel are also'burned out' and soon leave, no one will be able to take care of the patient." "I appealed.
“Patients and caregivers lying in bed with confirmed and untreated are trembling with anxiety,” he said. “Unless human resources are supported, the number of deaths will increase further because they cannot be properly treated.”
He also appealed that the situation cannot be solved by the capabilities of local health authorities, and that the government-level dedicated department to manage nursing hospitals and nursing homes should be created to mobilize all administrative power.
(Photo = Yonhap News)