From this week, blood banks under Sanquin are testing whether blood plasma from recovered coronavirus patients can help new patients. Health service GGD will contact recovered patients and ask them to make contact with the blood bank.
Participants will be asked to donate blood plasma a total of four times, at seven day intervals. Sanquin will remove the antibodies from cured patients' plasma and process it into Fresh Frozen Plasma (FFP), which can be given to Covid-19 patients via transfusion.
In the country's first national address by a prime minister in over 40 years, Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte laid out three possible scenarios that affect how the coronavirus pandemic will impact the Netherlands, pledged his support for workers and all business owners, and asked that the country unite to prevent the situation from spiraling out of control. The preference, he said, is a scenario where the country spreads out the rate of infection as much as possible, and he emphasized that the country must take action together to prevent two more-dangerous scenarios from occurring.
Tilburg and Breda, the two cities in the Netherlands home to the most patients with coronavirus, were also the two cities with the biggest increase in patients since Sunday. Both cities are located in the Noord-Brabant province, where at least 554 of the country's 1,413 patients reside.
The patient data released by the RIVM showed that 249 of the country's 355 municipalities are home to at least one coronavirus patient. All 12 provinces in the Netherlands now have at least 10 people who have been screened by health officials and diagnosed with the virus.
Another 176 people tested positive for the Covid-19 variant of coronavirus since Saturday, the second largest single-day increase in coronavirus patients in the Netherlands. It brings the country's total number of positive tests to 1,135.
"As of yesterday, eight patients died from COVID-19, ages 59 to 94. Most are over 70 years old and had underlying symptoms," public health agency RIVM said on Sunday. "In total, 20 people have now died from the illness. A total of 162 patients were or have been hospitalized."
There was a significant increase in emergent coronavirus cases in the cities of Amsterdam, Noord-Holland, and both Maastricht and Sittard-Geleen in Limburg. Exactly 200 municipalities of 355 had at least one resident who has been diagnosed with the Covid-19 variant of the virus. The 959 patients in the Netherlands, including 12 who later died, resided in cities spread across every province in the Netherlands.
A total of 959 people in the Netherlands have tested positive for the coronavirus strain which causes Covid-19, figures released on Saturday by public health agency RIVM show. It was an increase of 155, or 16 percent, over the 804 positive tests reported on Friday. That day set the country's benchmark for the largest single-day increase in patients at 190, and the smaller increase on Saturday is likely because of a policy shift about who gets tested in the Netherlands.
As the spread of coronavirus continued throughout the Netherlands, Prime Minister Mark Rutte implored people in the country to stop shaking hands. He made the statement, along with new advice to Noord-Brabant residents to work from home whenever possible, hours after the country's top health agency released statistics that showed that there have been 321 positive tests and the patients live in 100 different municipalities.
A new dataset released by health authority RIVM showed that a plurality of those who tested positive for coronavirus live in Noord-Brabant. Overall, some 57 of the country's 188 patients, a little over 30 percent, reside in the southern province.
Sixty more people in the Netherlands tested positive for coronavirus, bringing the total numver of cases in that country to 188. Forty percent of the new patients, 24, reside in the Noord-Brabant province.
All residents of the Noord-Brabant province were advised to stay home if they have symptoms of a cold, a cough, or a fever, health agency RIVM said on Friday. The warning came after it emerged that the province is the hardest hit of the Netherlands, with 34 of the country's 128 positive coronavirus cases residing in municipalities there, an NL Times analysis of RIVM statistics shows.
An 86-year-old man admitted to the Ikazia Hospital in Rotterdam with a Covid-19 infection died on Friday, public health institute RIVM announced. He is the first patient in the Netherlands to die as a result of the coronavirus outbreak.
The Groningen department of health service GGD is ready to receive the 900 members of student association Vindicat, who will be returning from their skiing holiday in northern Italy early on Saturday. The students will be returning by bus. At a special location set up by the GGD, they will be checked over and tested for coronavirus Covid-19, if necessary, AD reports.
The spread of coronavirus Covid-19 in the Netherlands is starting to mess with the preparations for the Eurovision Song Contest, set to be held in Rotterdam in May. At least three more people in the Netherlands tested positive for the virus on Thursday. Reports on social media indicate that at least three of the 900 Vindicat students currently skiing in northern Italy have been infected with the virus, but according to the Groningen student association, this is "fake news".
Fifteen more people in the Netherlands tested positive for coronavirus Covid-19, bringing the total number of diagnoses in the Netherlands up to 38, public health service RIVM said on Wednesday. Four of the new patients are in hospital, the other 11 are quarantined at home. One patient was traveling through the Netherlands and was offered accommodation for their quarantine period.
Public health institute RIVM confirmed six new coronavirus diagnoses in the Netherlands. These patients were reported to the RIVM on Monday and are all currently quarantined at home, the health service said. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs also updated its travel advice for Japan due to the virus.
The Haaglanden regional division of public health service GGD praised a 23-year-old woman form Delft for how she acted when she noticed that she had symptoms of the Covid-19 virus. The most important thing she did was stay in her home and contact her doctor by phone, thereby minimizing her contact with others, spokesperson Miranda de Haan of GGD Haaglanden said to NL Times.
Eight new patients were diagnosed with coronavirus on Monday, health agency RIVM said on Monday. "This brings the total number of positive tests in the Netherlands to 18," the agency stated.
"Nearly all new persons diagnosed with the new coronavirus are travelers from northern Italy or are family contacts of a previous patient," the statement continued. The health service GGD is now investigating who the new patients have made contact with recently.
Three more people in the Netherlands were diagnosed with the Covid-19 strain of coronavirus on Sunday, the health agency RIVM announced at a press conference. The statement was made amid reports that the Beatrixziekenhuis, a hospital in Gorinchem, was closed to new patients on Friday, and those people who were already inside the facility were ordered to stay inside.
"Of these three patients, it is not yet known how they became infected," the RIVM said in a statement it issued to the public.
A resident of the Zuid-Holland city of Delft tested positive for the Covid-19 strain of coronavirus, health authorities in the Netherlands said Saturday night. She was the first person in that province and the seventh person in the country to be diagnosed with the virus.
Two more people in the Netherlands were diagnosed with the Covid-19 strain of coronavirus on Saturday. The wife and daughter of the country's first coronavirus patient tested positive, according to health agency RIVM.
It brings the total number of patients in the Netherlands to six. The public health service GGD is working to determine who the new patients came in contact with recently, and are screening those people for the virus.
The woman from the Amsterdam region who was diagnosed with coronavirus Covid-19 on Friday is an employee of the Amsterdam UMC, the hospital confirmed on Friday. She did not work with patients. The woman does not have to be hospitalized. Her symptoms are minor enough that she can safely be quarantined at her home in Diemen, Aura Timen, spokesperson for public health institute RIVM, said to NOS.
The Noord-Brabant man being treated for Covid-19 in the Elisabeth-TweeSteden hospital in Tilburg is doing well, Tilburg mayor Theo Weterings said in a press conference on Friday. The mayor also confirmed that the man celebrated carnival in his hometown, but said that he was not yet contagious when this happened, NOS and NU.nl report.
The health authorities are considering discharging the man, so that he can be quarantined in the comfort of his own home in Loon op Zand, Weterings said.
A resident of the Amsterdam region tested positive for coronavirus Covid-19 on Friday morning, public health institute RIVM announced. She is currently in quarantine at a home in Diemen, which neighbors the capital.
According to the RIVM, this patient has no connection with the Noord-Brabant man diagnosed on Thursday. Like him, she also visited the Lombardy region of Italy, where hundreds of people have tested positive for the Covid-19 viral strain over the past week.
A Dutch person who traveled to the Lombardy region of Italy is the first in the Netherlands to have tested positive for the Covid-19 coronavirus strain, Dutch health agency RIVM announced Thursday evening. The man, which BD reported as a 56-year-old from Loon op Zand, Noord-Brabant, was placed in quarantine, authorities confirmed.
