Corona situation: Infections at a record level – fears that hospitals will be overloaded

The RKI reports the current figures on the corona situation in Germany. The rising infections are putting the healthcare system to the test. The news ticker.

+++ 1:53 p.m .: The increasing number of corona infections could soon put Berlin’s hospitals under a stress test. “We have lost staff, and the staff that is still there – nobody can do that anymore. If we have the number of patients from the second wave again – no matter which ward – then there is really a risk of overloading, ”said the chief physician at the Sankt Gertrauden Hospital in Berlin-Wilmersdorf, Jörg Weimann, the daily newspaper taz (Friday).

“We have already postponed almost all postponed treatments. This will continue. And this wave that is coming now can hardly be compared with the past waves,” said Weimann, who is the chief physician for anesthesia and interdisciplinary intensive care medicine. “Now we intensive care physicians are rather pessimists by nature and are preparing for the worst.”

According to Weimann, it is not possible to say seriously how bad it will be: “But if we actually have a high failure in all areas of life including the hospitals at the same time and many patients come – even if they only need oxygen and someone to look after them – then we are in a situation where not much is possible.”

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Corona pandemic: WHO recommends new Covid 19 drugs

+++ 12.44 p.m .: The World Health Organization (WHO) recommends two other drugs for the treatment of Covid 19 patients. These are the active ingredient baricitinib, which was developed to treat rheumatoid arthritis, and sotrovimab, a monoclonal antibody developed specifically for Covid 19 patients. The new recommendation is based on seven studies with more than 4000 patients, the WHO experts reported in the specialist magazine “The BMJ”.

According to the new guideline, seriously ill Covid-19 patients have better chances of survival with baricitinib and the need for artificial ventilation is reduced. No side effects were observed. The drug should be administered in combination with corticosteroids.

WHO advises against ruxolitinib and tofacitinib

Covid-19 patients with a less severe course of the disease but a high risk of hospitalization could benefit from the use of the monoclonal antibody sotrovimab, writes the WHO. The product with the brand name Xevudy is also approved in the EU. The WHO has already advocated the use of another antibody cocktail, casirivimab/imdevimab.

The WHO advises against the use of two other drugs, ruxolitinib and tofacitinib. Small studies have so far shown no benefit, and serious side effects could develop with tofacitinib.

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Karl Lauterbach: “Have the means to largely end the pandemic this year”

+++ 11.20 a.m .: The new quarantine rules for corona infected people and contact persons can come into force. After the Bundestag, the Bundesrat also approved an ordinance on Friday (01/14/2022) that creates a legal framework for this. Among other things, it stipulates that triple-vaccinated contact persons of corona infected people no longer have to go into quarantine. In addition, this enables shorter quarantine times in the event of infections in order to prevent a collapse in personnel in important care areas when the number of infections increases sharply.

In the special session of the state chamber, Federal Health Minister Karl Lauterbach (SPD) said that the pandemic had arrived at an “interface”. You’re in your third year. This raises the question of whether it will be possible to defuse the pandemic in such a way that an endemic situation with only sporadic outbreaks and few deaths is reached – or whether this opportunity will be missed. “We must seize this opportunity and we have the means to do so. We have the means to largely end the pandemic in Germany this year.”

+++ 11.05 a.m .: In view of the rapid spread of the omicron variant of the corona virus, the Education and Science Union (GEW) has warned of further learning gaps in schools. In order to prevent this, affected teachers should also teach from the quarantine in order to “keep the loss of lessons as low as possible,” said GEW boss Maike Finnern of Wirtschaftswoche. It is questionable, however, whether the “technical requirements in the school are even available” for such hybrid teaching.

Virologist: “Contact tracing is pointless”

+++ 9.50 a.m .: The virologist Klaus Stöhr no longer considers contact tracing to combat the corona pandemic in Germany to be useful. “We need an exit plan,” he said in a podcast by Kölner Stadt-Anzeiger and Redaktionsnetzwerk Deutschland (RND), according to a pre-announcement on Friday (January 14, 2022). “I can’t tell you why you should still do contact tracing in Germany. In terms of incidence, the health authorities can no longer cope.”

“If a large part of the population is mildly and asymptomatically infected and has antibodies, a so-called contact tracing quarantine becomes pointless,” Stöhr affirmed. “The best way out of the pandemic would be to get vaccinated first and then get infected.” The “package” would then provide long-lasting immune protection.

Karl Lauterbach comments on the corona situation in Germany

+++ 8.50 a.m .: Federal Minister of Health Karl Lauterbach will comment on the Corona situation before the federal press conference (1 p.m.) today. In addition, the Federal Council wants to clear the way for the implementation of the latest federal and state decisions on new quarantine rules today (Friday, January 14th, 2022, 10 a.m.). The chamber of the federal states decides on the protective measures exception regulation approved by the federal government on Wednesday (12.01.2022), which sets the framework for the planned innovations. The ordinance to be voted on defines the basic exceptions to quarantine and isolation due to vaccination or recovery.

The new regulations agreed by the federal and state governments last Friday must now be implemented in concrete terms through state regulations. Contact persons who have been boosted should therefore no longer have to go into quarantine in the future. Federal Minister of Health Karl Lauterbach (SPD) is also to speak for the first time at the special meeting of the Federal Council.

Corona case numbers: RKI reports historic highs – over 92,000 new infections, incidence 470

First report: Berlin/Frankfurt – The number of new corona infections reached the next daily high with 92,223 reported cases. The highest level so far was only reported yesterday (01/13/2022) with 81,417 new infections. The incidence value for new infections in Germany has also been increasing continuously for weeks.

Corona case numbers in Germany: overview of new infections, deaths, incidence

The Robert Koch Institute (RKI) announced the seven-day incidence for today (January 14, 2022) – it is 470.6 and is thus higher than ever. Yesterday, Thursday, the incidence was 427.7. The previous high was 452.4 on November 29, 2021. The value quantifies the number of new infections per 100,000 inhabitants over a period of seven days. A week ago, the nationwide seven-day incidence was 303.4.

As the RKI further announced, citing data from the health authorities, 286 new deaths related to the corona virus were counted on Friday. According to the latest information from the institute, the health authorities have recorded a total of 7,835,451 cases of infection since the beginning of the pandemic.

The total number of registered corona deaths in Germany rose to 115,337. The institute put the number of people in Germany who had recovered from an illness caused by the coronavirus at around 6,914,700.

Corona case numbers in Germany: hospitalization incidence nationwide at 3.09

In November, the federal and state governments had defined the so-called hospitalization incidence as the decisive benchmark for tightening the corona measures. This value indicates how many people per 100,000 inhabitants are in the hospital within seven days because of a corona infection. According to the latest RKI report on Thursday, the hospitalization incidence nationwide was 3.09.

Corona case numbers in Germany: Omikron now dominant

As the RKI stated in its latest weekly report on Thursday, the highly contagious omicron variant is now also the dominant variant of the corona virus in Germany. Accordingly, the proportion of all cases transmitted in the first calendar week of this year was 73 percent. However, there are still major differences nationwide. According to the institute, the Omicron share was between eleven percent in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania and 96 percent in Bremen.

The RKI warned that a sharp increase in infections is expected in the next few weeks, including among those who have been vaccinated and those who have recovered. Initial studies indicated a lower proportion of hospitalizations in those fully vaccinated compared to infections with the delta variant. However, the data situation is not yet sufficient for a final assessment of the severity of the diseases caused by the omicron variant. (skr with afp/dpa)

List of rubrics: © Jens Büttner/dpa