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South Africa





HOSPITAL BEDS SHORTAGE FOR VERY ILL COVID-19 PATIENTS A POSSIBILITY, ACTUARIAL
BODY WARNS




By TAMAR KAHN - 18 March 2020 - 12:43


Picture: SOWETAN-SUNDAY WORLD

 At least one-million people might require acute hospital care if there is
sustained community transmission of Covid-19 in SA, according to projections by
an expert from the Actuarial Society of SA (Assa).

The forecast raises the spectre of a looming shortage of beds for critically ill
patients, as only about 1,000 of the 85,000 beds in the public sector are set
aside for intensive care, according to Assa member Shivani Ranchod, CEO of
Percept Health.



There were approximately 40,000 hospital beds in the private sector in
2016/2017, she said.

The health department had not responded to Business Day’s request for hospital
bed figures at the time of publication, but Wits health economist Alex van den
Heever estimated that there were approximately 4,960 critical care beds in the
private sector in 2017. He estimated there were approximately 2,240 critical
care beds in the state sector, which unlike the private sector were currently
running at high occupancy rates, topping 80%. Private sector occupancy rates
were approximately half that figure, he said.

The projection of one-million people requiring acute care in hospital was based
on a conservative estimate that only 40% of the population caught Covid-19, and
5% were critically ill, Ranchod said. Many epidemiologists are projecting much
greater infection rates, of up to 70% of the population.

SA's health system was not equipped to deal with a sudden surge in the number of
patients requiring acute care, and so it was vital to slow the spread of the
virus as much as possible, said Ranchod. Spreading the number of cases out over
a longer period of time would place less strain on hospital services, which are
buckling in hard-hit countries such as Italy.

“It clearly illustrates that we need to combine public and private capacity to
have the best shot at dealing with this, not to mention slowing down the impact
on acute facilities,” she said.

Coronavirus watch

Covid-19 is a potentially severe respiratory disease caused by a new coronavirus
called SARS-CoVid-2, and there is currently no vaccine or cure. The rapid spread
of Covid-19 has been fuelled by the fact that the vast majority (80%) of cases
are mild, which means people remain mobile and continue to spread the virus, she
said.

“It is therefore critically important that anyone who suspects they have the
virus self-isolates,” she said.

As of Wednesday morning, SA’s tally of Covid-19 cases stood at 116, including 14
cases of local transmission, according to health minister Zweli Mkhize.

Globally, the number of confirmed cases rose past 198,000, according to data
compiled by the Johns Hopkins University Centre for Systems Science and
Engineering.

Global deaths topped 7,950, while more than 81,960 people had recovered, it
said.

Italy, which has had the second-biggest outbreak after China, had recorded more
than 31,500 cases, 2,500 deaths and 2,940 recoveries by Wednesday. It has a
population of 60.5-million people.

-BusinessLIVE

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