The COVID-19 pandemic is still ongoing and, although we are seeing a lighter course of the disease, it is still a heavy burden on the health care system and its scale in Poland is underestimated, experts estimate. And they also point to other infectious respiratory diseases that can be avoided or mitigated through vaccination and medication.
Last week, as part of a debate organised in cooperation with the Polish Society for the Advancement of Medicine and the Alliance Poland Healthy Breathing, we discussed the current epidemiological situation. The experts pointed out, among other things, that the peak incidence of COVID-19 may occur again at the turn of January and February. So there is still a chance to at least mitigate this wave and take care of your health. Watch the video and read the text below.
The moderator of the debate and one of its experts - Prof. Krzysztof J. Filipiak, Rector of the M. Skłodowska-Curie Medical University in Warsaw, President of the Polish Society for Progress in Medicine MEDYCYNA XXI. drew attention to the problem of insufficient data on the number of people infected- None of us know exactly where we are in the pandemic, because the Ministry of Health has actually stopped practising an active policy of looking for infected people, we have stopped testing. Even those tests that are done are mostly done by someone buying an antigen test in a pharmacy, so the results of those tests don't go anywhere, into any database," he explains.
This aspect was also pointed out by another expert in the debate. virologist and microbiologist at the Department of Medical Microbiology of the Medical University of Warsaw Tomasz Dzieciątkowski, MD, PhD We do not know, due to limited mass testing, due to limited sequencing of samples, the system not accepting results from home testing or pharmacy testing. What is the situation with other infectious diseases? It looks like there has been some rebound, that is, people have started to go to the doctor and we are seeing an increase compared to 2020 and 2021. Also, upper respiratory infections are slowly coming back, due to the epidemic season
Tomasz Dzieciątkowski, MD, PhD He also stressed the need to continue to use common sense. - Social distance, if only in public places, especially in supermarket queues, will never do any harm, even outside of a pandemic.
The experts also highlighted the issue of coronavirus testing, which the participants felt was much needed, not least because of the possibility of administering oral antiviral drugs to patients with confirmed infection, which significantly reduce the risk of severe disease, which is particularly important in the elderly.
COVID-19 has not disappeared from hospitals either. Hospitals are still receiving patients with severe coronavirus infections, and although there are fewer patients, there are still many who need help.
- COVID-19 has not disappeared, there are very diverse patients coming in. It's also a challenge for us to provide them with a quick diagnosis and the right conditions, because we have to isolate these patients, explains Czesław Ducki. And COVID patients can happen to us in the ED or already in the ward. - There are no longer any temporary, one-name hospitals, the whole process of treatment and therapy of these patients is carried out at our facility, then they are transferred to individual wards, and there we have to provide rooms, proper isolation, proper conditions for the staff and other patients as well. This is still a big challenge," he believes. - he emphasised Czesław Ducki, Deputy Medical Director of the Mazovian Bródnowski Hospital in Warsaw.
Ducki also draws attention to remote pocovid syndromes. - Even if this course is milder, unfortunately, each subsequent illness increases the risk of late complications after COVID-19, whether from the nervous system, from the dermatological side, also from the gastrointestinal side. These are new syndromes, they have a very diverse set of symptoms and, de facto, we also do not yet have as much experience and tools on how to treat these late pocovid complications.
According to another debate expert Dr Jakub Gierczynski, health care expert lessons learned from the COVID-19 vaccination campaign should be applied by the government to other diseases -. Knowing, among other things, how many people were willing to be vaccinated when it was free and with facilitation of, among other things, appointments. This can be done step by step - targeting at-risk groups: to start with, allow free vaccination against influenza, against pneumococcus. He also drew attention to the fact that, thanks to campaigns carried out by local authorities, e.g. flu vaccinations, we have reliable data from actual practice as to how many people have signed up for such vaccinations and whether, in fact, these people have not subsequently been hospitalised or required specialist visits because they have simply not been ill or have passed these infections lightly. - We should definitely start to invest more in immunizations, both for children and adults, that is, vaccinations throughout the citizen's life cycle - Gierczynski concluded.
Also according to Dr Dzieciątkowski, vaccination promotion activities in Poland were late and insufficient: - This should have been done 2 years ago. At the moment, it seems that we have reached the maximum of what was to be achieved, i.e. a vaccination level of 60-something per cent if we are talking about basic doses. As far as the uptake of the second booster is concerned, here it must be said clearly: there is a drama. In Poland, a dozen or so per cent took up the second booster, which is far from enough," the expert appealed.
Originally published on Cowzdrowiu.pl / Video material portal cowzdrowiu.pl