About 600 hospital beds for coronavirus patients are filled in Moscow within two days, which is the capacity of the clinic for coronavirus patients in Kommunarka, Moscow Mayor Sergey Sobyanin said on Thursday.
"Five days ago we had about 13,000 [beds for COVID-19 patients], and we filled them to capacity within several days. Within this period of time we deployed another 3,000 beds and practically every day 200 to 300 beds are filled," the mayor said.
If this pace persists, Moscow authorities will have to repurpose hospitals to treat COVID-19 patients. However, this cannot continue indefinitely, he stressed.
"This is not only about hospital beds, but we are also talking about intensive therapy, emergency physicians, treatment," Sobyanin said. "We are repurposing outpatient clinics one after another for computer tomography and diagnostics and practically every week we are increasing the number of outpatient clinics that work mainly with COVID-19 patients," he went on to say. "Of course, this is a serious problem for everybody - for the residents with other illnesses and for elective care," the mayor explained. He said that Moscow was holding out because it had accumulated experience and had created the most powerful among other cities medical system.
According to the mayor, 17,000 hospital beds are deployed in the capital city for coronavirus patients for now, and shortly their number will exceed 20,000. "Practically none of the European cities can afford this. But let me say once again - these are not indefinite possibilities, we are a step away from more tough decisions - temporary but tough decisions on restrictions," the Moscow mayor stressed.
