Hospitals face breaking point in virus surge

DR LUCA Cabrini was certain that his hospital in the heart of Lombardy‘s lake district would reach its breaking point caring for 300 COVID-19 patients. So far, virus patients fill 500 beds and counting.

Italy, which shocked the world and itself when hospitals in the wealthy north were overwhelmed with coronavirus cases last spring, is again facing a systemic crisis as confirmed positives pass the symbolic threshold of one million.

“We are very close to not keeping up. I cannot say when we will reach the limit, but that day is not far off,” said Cabrini, who runs the intensive care ward at Varese’s Circolo hospital, the largest in the province of one million people northwest of Milan.

ICU WARD

The hospital expanded its 20-bed ICU ward to 45 beds during Italy’s deadly spring peak. It had 38 patients last weekend, and Cabrini was preparing to set up beds in an operating theatre this week, “something we would have preferred to avoid”.

As dire as Italy’s ICU situation is once again, it is not critical care that is most worrying doctors during the pandemic’s autumn resurgence. It is subintensive and infectious disease wards caring for less gravely ill patients, who are often younger and sometimes require care for longer periods.

The Italian doctors federation called this week for a nationwide lockdown to forestall a collapse of the medical system, marked by the closure of non-emergency procedures.