Covid-19 in hospitals down 5% after weekend; 574 more infections

There were 162 people being treated in Dutch hospitals for Covid-19 on Monday, a decrease of nine compared to the previous day. The total included 41 intensive care patients, a decrease of one, and 121 outside of the ICU, a reduction of eight, according to figures from patient coordination office LCPS.

Early data from public health agency RIVM added another 574 positives tests for the SARS-CoV-2 novel coronavirus to the Dutch total on Monday. Approximately 67,500 people in the Netherlands have tested positive for the virus since the end of February.

While the number of Covid-19 patients remained stable, the head of the Dutch acute care providers network, Ernst Kuipers, said he was also troubled by the fact that intensive care units in the Netherlands were only at about 50 percent capacity, with around 600 patients in the ICU system. "The overall IC occupancy remains unchanged and very low, even for the holiday period. This is a sign that regular care is still not back to normal," he said.

The RIVM said that 23 more people were admitted to hospitals from Friday through Sunday for treatment of the coronavirus disease. Ten people were also moved into intensive care over that time period.

Since late February, 3,022 people in the Netherlands have been admitted to intensive care for treatment of Covid-19. Of that group, 1,956 were eventually released from the hospital, while 879 died in intensive care, according to revised figures from nonprofit organization NICE.