Millionth positive Covid test in Netherlands
Almost a year after the first coronavirus diagnosis in the Netherlands, the country reached the grim milestone of the 1 millionth positive Covid-19 test. On Saturday, February 6, the national health institute RIVM announced that 1,001,826 have tested positive for the virus since the start of the pandemic.
The first case of Covid-19 in the Netherlands was diagnosed in the Noord-Brabant town of Loon op Zand on 27 February 2020, less than a month shy of a year ago. After that, the number of infections increased explosively The 500 thousand mark was reached on November 26 last year.
The actual number of coronavirus infections is believed to be much higher. In the first wave of the pandemic testing was very limited, only opening up to everyone with symptoms on June 1. A massive 95 percent of people who tested positive were diagnosed after that date.
Last month, blood bank Sanquin reported that 13.3 percent of blood donors have coronavirus anti-bodies in their system. The blood bank considers blood donors a good representation of the Dutch population. If that is the case, it means that some 2.26 million Netherlands residents have had the virus.
On Friday, Statistics Netherlands reported that up to the start of November 2020, nearly 13 thousand people in the Netherlands died of the coronavirus. The first Covid-19 death was on 6 March 2020, when an 86-year-old man from Rotterdam succumbed to the disease in the Ikazia Hospital.
