District of Munich – Health Department overwhelmed – District of Munich

The omicron wave is also piling up in the Munich district and is bringing the health department and laboratories to their capacity limits to such an extent that they are only panting behind when it comes to registering and tracking the new corona cases. According to its own calculations, the district office had corrected the seven-day incidence to 999.2 on Wednesday evening, while the Robert Koch Institute (RKI) still published a value of only 571.1 the following morning. In the meantime, another 1,020 late registrations and 1,253 new cases have piled up. “Tomorrow we will very definitely have an incidence of over a thousand,” said the district administrator at his weekly Corona press conference on Thursday afternoon. The authority therefore relies heavily on the personal responsibility of those affected.

“Omicron delivers what it promised. It captures everyone.”

Göbel can announce the high numbers relatively calmly, because exceeding the thousand limit will not have any impact on public life after the state government has suspended the so-called hotspot rule for the time being. Counties with incidences of more than 1000 do not therefore have to go into lockdown – gastronomy, hotels, sports and cultural sites can remain open. What also reassures Göbel despite the record values: None of the newly infected people have had to go to the hospital so far. The hospitalization rate, which indicates how many people are being treated as inpatients or in intensive care, is still zero in the district.

The health department assumes that the infection process will continue to pick up speed. “The numbers are exploding, anything else would be totally amazing,” said Göbel, noting: “Omicron keeps what it promised. It captures everyone who was in a situation where they could get infected.” There are currently 1409 infected people in schools and daycare centers, 64 residents and 83 employees in old people’s and nursing homes with a positive test. Almost one hundred percent of the registered new infections can now be traced back to the virus variant from South Africa. Even if omicron was only actually confirmed in 47 cases by full genome sequencing, which, according to the district administrator, no longer plays a major role. There are 3410 suspected cases, and so far no such case has been wrong.

The numbers must be reported to the RKI by 2 p.m. – that’s no longer possible

Jörg Spennemann, head of the health department in the district office, explains why the published numbers are currently lagging behind the reported infections: The health authorities have to transmit their infection numbers to the RKI by 2 p.m. one day. “If that happens at 2:05 p.m., the numbers are no longer recorded,” says Spennemann. In the authority in the district of Munich, however, it is assumed that other health authorities are currently not doing any differently. “This is due to the amount and of course affects districts with a large number of inhabitants in particular,” said the district administrator. The capacities are limited, and those who are behind with the processing of the cases previously had too many staff.

Contact persons of infected people are currently almost no longer called or written to by the authorities in the Munich district. The focus is on the vulnerable groups of people, and the infected themselves sometimes wait a long time for the health department to contact them. “We have to rely on the infected people informing their contact persons,” says Göbel. The authority also relies on the fact that those affected now know what to do. You can read the rules of conduct in the Corona warning app and on the website of the district office. “Otherwise, the information often only reaches people when they have long since tested themselves again,” admits the district administrator. However, he also asks those who have been boosted, who are known to no longer have to be in quarantine as contact persons, to be tested voluntarily. After all, they too could pass on the virus.

.
source site