Some indicators suggest that the virus is beginning to “slow down” in the territory
In the last week alone, more than 800,000 diagnostic tests have been carried out in Catalonia.
Catalonia studies the possible irruption of the omicron sublineagealso known as the ‘stealth variant‘, in the territory. As explained this Wednesday by the Secretary of Public Health, Carmen Headsthe ‘ministry’ of Health studies “one or two cases” of covid-19 that could be related to this emerging lineage and that, right now, they are going through a complete sequencing process to confirm their genetic identity. “Early data on this sublineage indicates that it has more mutations. It also seems more communicablealthough we have no evidence that it is more severe,” said Cabezas. Denmarkthe first country to notify this subvariant, covid-19 cases have skyrocketed again.
Catalonia is preparing to relax the restrictions against covid-19 at a time of particular uncertainty in which, according to epidemiological data, it is still not clear whether the peak of the sixth wave has been overcome. As Cabezas pointed out this Wednesday, the indicators of the last week suggest that we are facing a “slowdown” in the spread of the virus. Both the positivity rate (now 21.11%) and the Rt (1.14), two of the main indicators to assess the evolution of the pandemic, continue to point to high figures although, little by little, they seem to be falling. Likewise, the incidence of cases also begins to decline in some age groups.
“We continue in a very high incidence, although a large part are mild or asymptomatic cases. But we must bear in mind that Catalonia is making a very high diagnostic effortwith almost 10,000 tests carried out per 100,000 inhabitants, more than double that of the whole of Spain“, added the secretary of Public Health. According to figures from the ‘conselleria’, only in the last week more than 800,000 diagnostic tests in Catalonia. “Thanks to this diagnostic effort we are detecting cases that would go unnoticed in other communities,” said Cabezas.
The covid-19 pandemic, after two years of travel, already adds more than two million infections reported in Catalonia. The increase in infections caused by the emergence of the omicron variant, protagonist of the sixth wave, outpatient clinics continue to collapse and primary care centers. In recent weeks, more than 100,000 patients affected by this virus have been treated. At the moment, moreover, as reflected in the latest bulletin from the ‘ministry’ of Health, also there are 2,862 patients admitted with covid-19 Y 495 infected by coronavirus in intensive care units. The healthcare pressure caused by this virus, as well as hospital stress, remain at high levels although, little by little, it seems that these indicators are beginning to decline.
Change of criteria in the ICU count
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According to data from the ‘ministry’ of Health, a 85% of critically ill patients admitted by omicron in the covid units of Catalonia they are unvaccinated, immunosuppressed or people with severe comorbidities. And unvaccinated people have 2.4 times more likely to be hospitalized Y 4.4 more than entering the ICU than vaccinated people. “Soon we will add a new variable to count the cases of covid-19 to the ICUs for distinguish patients admitted for covid-19 and those admitted with covid-19“, added the director of the Catalan Health Service, Gemma Craywinckel. “We have to be able to differentiate the cases in which covid-19 has taken a patient to the ICU and those that have not,” he added.
According to Cabezas, around the 7% of covid-19 cases detected in Catalonia They are reinfections. To be more exact, according to data from the ‘ministry’ of Health, a 7.52% of infections in those under 50 years of age and 6.49% of cases in those over 50 have been detected in patients who had already had a covid-19 infection and have been infected again after the outbreak of a new variant of the coronavirus.