Medical personnel in full protective suits are seen as they treat a patient infected with the coronaviruses COVID - 19 in the intensive care unit at Maastricht UMC Hospital in Maastricht, Netherlands, November 10, 2020. AMSTERDAM, Nov 30 Reuters - The Dutch healthcare system scrambled to add intensive care beds for COVID 19 patients as the country registered a record weekly number of new infections on Tuesday.
The weekly infection figures of the National Institute for Health RIVM showed signs of stabilisation and rose just 1% from the week before, to 155,152, despite hospitals being under extreme stress and scrapping routine procedures and planned care.
The impact of the new lockdown measures ordered by Prime Minister Mark Rutte's government on Friday is not yet reflected in the weekly numbers, as they went into effect on Sunday. The new measures include the closure of bars, restaurants, and most stores from 5 p.m. to 5 a.m. as well as work from home instructions and mask-wearing in secondary schools.
There were fewer than 100 unoccupied intensive care beds in the Netherlands on Tuesday, with 595 taken by COVID 19 patients and another 500 by patients with other illnesses.
The peak capacity of 1,350 ICU beds was achieved during the initial COVID 19 wave in April 2020, with more than 40 per day of ICU admissions running at more than 40 per day.
A third of hospitals in the country have stopped offering care that can be planned in advance, and almost a third have said they can't always perform critical surgeries that can be planned in advance, the Netherlands' Care Authority NZa said on Tuesday.