Continued decline of Covid-19 patients in intensive care

There were 564 patients with Covid-19 in intensive care on Friday, down by 20 from a day earlier. Overall, the number of Dutch patients in ICU has fallen by 60 percent since April 9 when there were 1,417 patients being treated for the coronavirus disease.

With week-on-week decreases of about 20 percent for three weeks in a row, acute care network chair Ernst Kuipers said he expected that about 435 patients would still be in intensive care at the end of next week. "We will continue to monitor this closely, also in view of the relaxation of the measures. We now know that the number of hospital admissions is not a good predictor of the ICU admissions, because the ICU admission usually takes place within a day of admission," Kuipers said.

"So we need other predictors. Easily accessible testing is important," he continued. Health Minister Hugo de Jonge said on Tuesday that nasal swab testing will be made available to many more members of the public in the upcoming weeks.

Patients will continue to be transferred from busy medical facilities to those with more space in their ICU for the time being, the patient coordination office LCPS said. There were still 15 patients receiving care in Germany, and Dutch ICUs were treating 435 patients for illnesses other than Covid-19.

In total, there have been 2,854 patients with Covid-19 treated in intensive care, of which 849 have recovered, said intensive care nonprofit NICE. Another 661 were transferred out and still receiving care in another ward.

At least 748 died during treatment in ICU.