As of 8:00 a.m. on Friday, a total of 1,198 people were being treated for coronavirus Covid-19 in intensive care units at hospitals across the Netherlands, according to figures released by foundation NICE. 74 Dutch hospitals have at least one coronavirus patient in their ICU.
A total of 1,629 Covid-19 patients have been treated in ICUs since the outbreak started in the Netherlands at the end of February. 214 of them died. Others recovered and were discharged from the intensive care.
As of 9:50 a.m. on Thursday, a total 1,176 patients were being treated for coronavirus Covid-19 in intensive care units across the Netherlands, according to figures from foundation NICE. That is an increase of 24 ICU patients compared to Wednesday morning.
Since the start of the Covid-19 outbreak in the Netherlands, 1,548 patients with the coronavirus were admitted to intensive care. 199 of them died, and 51 recovered enough to be discharged from the ICU.
The coronavirus will likely mean that the life expectancy in the Netherlands will fall this year, experts from Statistic Netherlands and the University of Amsterdam, and the association for intensive care NVIC said to newspaper AD.
Another 134 people succumbed to the coronavirus, brining the total number of Covid-19 deaths in the Netherlands to 1,173, public health substitute RIVM said on Wednesday. Two people who died were under the age of 50, the RIVM said. One was a man between the ages of 35 and 39, while the other was a woman between 45 and 49.
Where ICU nurses normally care for two patients at a time, they are now caring for three or even four during the coronavirus, Diederik Gommers of the intensive care association NVIC said in a briefing to parliament on Wednesday. "That is stressful. The nurses feel the pressure. They feel the stress that they are not in control, that if they make mistakes, patients die," Gommers said, NU.nl reports.
A total of 1,072 people are being treated for coronavirus Covid-19 in intensive care in Dutch hospitals, according to figures released by foundation NICE on Tuesday morning. That is an increase of 46 compared to Monday. In total, ICUs in the country have treated 1,323 coronavirus patients. 149 of them died. Others recovered.
Another 93 people reportedly died after testing positive for coronavirus, public health agency RIVM said on Monday, bringing the country's total number of fatal cases to 864. More patients were also admitted to intensive care units through the course of the day, with the total number of known infections in the Netherlands rising to 11,750, an increase of 884 since Sunday.
The results of measures taken by the government to curb the spread the coronavirus Covid-19 are starting to show, and they are less effective than public health institute RIVM had hoped. The institute now expects more people to end up in intensive care. "The most positive scenarios from last week will not come true," Jaco Wallinga of the RIVM said to NOS.
The availability of beds in intensive care units at Dutch hospitals fell further on Friday, with 873 placements in ICUs now occupied by Covid-19 patients. There was an increase of about 15.5 percent from Thursday's total, with 118 more patients admitted into an ICU in the 24-hour period.
Security services in the Netherlands have been warning about the dangers of a pandemic like the coronavirus since 2016. In reports by the national coordinator for counterterrorism and security NCTV, the security services warned that the Netherlands does not have enough ICU beds, among other things, NRC reports based on its own research. It seems little was done with this advice.
A total of 761 coronavirus patients were being treated in intensive care units in the Netherlands as of Thursday, up 18 percent from 644 on Wednesday, according to figures released by the association for intensive care NVIC. There are "few" beds available for new patients, the association said.
The number of available beds in ICU went from "sufficient" to "few" on Tuesday.
Congress center RAI in Amsterdam and event hall Ahoy in Rotterdam are looking into whether and how they can serve as emergency locations to take in patients during the coronavirus crisis, the two venues confirmed to BNR.
RAI CEO Paul Riemens met with Amsterdam mayor Femke Halsema on Wednesday. Nothing concrete has been decided yet, he said to the broadcaster. "But if indeed it turns out that there will soon be too few beds, it is expected that an appeal will be made to the RAI," he said.
A total of 546 patients with coronavirus Covid-19 are currently being treated in intensive care units in the Netherlands, according to the latest figures from intensive care association NVIC. The number of patients rose by 20 percent on Monday and 12 percent on Tuesday, resulting in the number of available beds dropping from "sufficient" to "few".
NVIC chairman Diederik Gommers told RTL Nieuws that they are taking tings day by day. "I can't look into a crystal ball," he said. "If 30 new patients are added tomorrow I will be a happy man. If that is 80 tomorrow, I will be somber."
The Dutch association for intensive care units NVIC is expecting between 500 and a thousand new Covid-19 patients next week. In order to prepare, patients currently treated in ICUs in Noord-Brabant will be moved to hospitals in less affected areas, the association said in a statement.
On Wednesday evening, the NVIC reported that 177 coronavirus patients were being treated in ICU. The association did not give a reason for the expected spike.
Members of the Tweede Kamer debated the social distancing strategy presented by Prime Minister Mark Rutte to prevent the spread of the coronavirus, and widely expressed their approval to press forward. Hearings on the strategy began in the morning and continued in the afternoon and into the night, until Health Minister Bruno Bruins collapsed in the middle of debate.
