In the past 24 hours, another 101 medical workers who are fighting on the frontline against the COVID-19 epidemic in Ukraine have tested positive for the novel coronavirus, officials confirmed.
The surge in confirmed infections on April 26 brought the total tally of infected health care staff in Ukraine close to 1,700 – or about 20% of the current national total.
By the morning of April 26, the total number of infected health care workers in the country reached 1,676, Health Minister Maksym Stepanov said during a morning briefing to journalists.
The highest numbers of infected medical staff were registered in three oblasts – Chernivtsi, where the first country’s COVID-19 case was detected on March 3, and in Ternopil and Rivne.
In Kyiv, 10 more medical workers were newly diagnosed with the infection. Health care staff now account for 10% of all coronavirus cases in Ukraine’s capital, according to Kyiv Mayor Vitali Klitschko.
One patient is confirmed to have died from the 1,188 registered cases of people with COVID-19 disease in the city.
“I hope that the dynamics of the disease will not increase, so we can finally start weakening (quarantine). And the city will gradually return to normal life,” Klitschko wrote in the Telegram channel.
A lack of personal protective equipment for workers in Ukrainian hospitals is partly to blame for the large amount of infected staff. Experts here have warned that frontline health workers are at severe risk.
In late March, Volodymyr Kurpita, head of the Center for Public Health, Ukraine’s state health-monitoring body, told the Kyiv Post that healthcare workers were ill-equipped for the challenge ahead of them.
“We see a catastrophic lack of personal protective equipment in hospitals,” he said. “It can have serious consequences… for instance infected medical workers.”While Ukraine’s number of infected medical workers has risen dramatically over the past several weeks, in other countries the picture has been even worse.
In Italy almost 17,000 healthcare workers were diagnosed with COVID-19 disease as of April 16, according to country’s public health institute. According to the recent calculations by the United Nations that represents 20% of all coronavirus cases in the country.
Spain, one of the hardest hit European countries, has more than 35,000 healthcare workers infected with the disease, as of April 22. That figure represents about 15% of all registered cases of the disease, Spanish daily newspaper El Pais reported on April 25.
In the United States, now thought to be the worst hit country, at least 9,282 health care workers have been infected, according to a report by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Doctors and nurses around the globe are complaining about a lack of proper protection – respirators, medical face shields, and hazmat suits.
“The public knows that nurses’ safety is crucial for stopping the spread of COVID-19. Give us the armor we need to win this war!” New York State Nurses Association wrote on April 24.
“COVID-19 is an invisible enemy that can give a powerful kick. Healthcare workers have highest risk to get coronavirus infection,” wrote Lyudmyla Antonenko, chief doctor of Kyiv Oleksandrivska Hospital, on her Facebook page on April 22.
