Hospitals post biggest fall in Covid patients in months; New infections below 19K due to IT error
Hospitals in the Netherlands reported a three person decrease in the number of patients being actively treated for Covid-19. The RIVM also showed on Wednesday the lowest number of new coronavirus infections in over two week. The figure fell below 19,000, but was believed to be inaccurate due to an IT error.
Dutch hospitals were treating 2,768 people with Covid-19 on Wednesday afternoon, a three percent decrease in a day. It was the first time the figure improved in over a week. The last time such a high rate of decrease was reported was about two months ago. There were 77 fewer patients in care, after accounting for new admissions, discharges and deaths. That was the largest decline in absolute numbers since early June.
However, with patient admissions still high, healthcare officials still expected the figure to rise towards 3,200. The total of 2,768 was still 9 percent higher than a week ago. A similar increase would put the figure at above 3,000.
The current total includes 2,181 patients in regular care wards, a net decrease of 69. The other 587 were being treated in intensive care units, a net decrease of eight. An additional 10 patients from the Netherlands were being treated in German intensive care units.
Hospitals in the Netherlands admitted 364 people with Covid-19 in the past 24 hours, including 42 sent to an intensive care unit. A total of 2,465 such admissions occurred during the previous seven days, 10 percent higher than the previous week. Some 329 of them were sent directly to an ICU, up from 300 the previous week.
Meanwhile, data from the RIVM showed that 18,588 people tested positive for the SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus. That data was believed to be incomplete due to an IT outage at the health institute. It was not known how many records were missing, but the total was 16 percent below the seven day moving average reported on Tuesday.
The new figure brought the seven-day average down 3 percent to 21,464, based solely on raw data. That was 4 percent lower than a week ago, the first such week-to-week fall since October 3. Previously, the RIVM said that the number of new daily infections has largely stabilized at about 22,000. It also remains to be seen to what degree the Omicron variant will impact figures in the coming weeks and months.
The three cities with the most new infections were Amsterdam (632), Rotterdam (607), and The Hague (406). While Rotterdam’s total was less than 10 percent below average, the other two cities were closer to 20 percent below average.
Figures in Utrecht (228) and Almere (131) were both about 40 percent below their respective moving averages, showing signs of how missing data affected Wednesday’s data.