Dutch corona patients in intensive care units: 'More than half are under fifty'

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Today there are between forty and fifty corona patients in critical condition on Dutch intensive care units. “More than half of those patients are under fifty years old. There are also young people. "" That says chairman of the Dutch Association for Intensive Care (NVIC) Diederik Gommers, in an interview with this site. 

Marcia Nieuwenhuis 03/14/20, 9:23 PM Last update: 15:16

The professor of intensive care medicine, who himself heads the IC of Rotterdam's Erasmus MC, emphasizes that it is not only the elderly who are affected by the corona virus. ,, What has mainly made the news is that older people die faster. This is about 2.5 percent of the entire population, while about 15 percent of the elderly die. But more than half of those patients are under fifty years old. It also includes young people. ''

The specialist explains that it also regularly occurs with regular flu that younger people end up in intensive care. "You can see that with the flu: those people get serious double-sided pneumonia." In addition, the elderly also choose not to be treated in intensive care. 

16 year old

A  16-year-old boy  from Breda is infected with the coronavirus and is currently in the intensive care unit of the Erasmus MC-Sophia Children's Hospital. His family calls on the whole of the Netherlands: "Wake up and take this virus seriously."

The IC specialist also says that admissions to intensive care because of the Covid-19 virus can take weeks. ,, In Erasmus there are two patients who have been on respiration for three weeks now. All other patients in the intensive care unit are shorter there. ''

Dutch doctors have also been informed about patients from Lombardy, Italy, who confirm data that young and relatively healthy people are also affected by the corona virus. ,, The youngest intubated Covid-19 patient is a girl of 16 years old. Two children with Covid-19 were admitted to the pediatric IC for observation but did not require additional therapy, '' the information circulated among Dutch physicians says. The first patient in that Italian region to receive a ventilator was ventilated for eighteen days, while he was relatively healthy. "It was a 38-year-old, otherwise very healthy man, who ran marathons for this."

Main risk factor for obesity

The average age of all covid-19 ic patients in Lombardy, Italy, was 70 years, according to which 'the main risk factor for ic uptake is obesity'. According to that information, the transmission of corona from mother to unborn children seems to 'not take place'. ,, This is based on three positively tested mothers (all incidentally complaint-free) who gave birth to a child which tested negative for covid-19. The same was observed in China, '' according to the information distributed to Dutch specialists based on the Italian region. 

Rest and control

According to Gommers, it is 'busy' in the Netherlands for the departments for the most seriously ill patients, who need continuous care and monitoring, 'but because precautions have been taken, it is still possible'. “I have had both Den Bosch and Amphia in Breda on the line today. There is peace and control . ''

According to the chairman of the IC doctors in the Netherlands, there are currently 'about forty to fifty people in intensive care units, that is the position this morning'. “In Breda, for example, the large intensive care units have between eight to ten patients. That is about 30 percent of the total capacity. It is therefore a little less busy than I initially expected, '' admits the chairman of the intensive care association, who warned that after this weekend not only  the Brabant but also the Rotterdam intensive care would fill up .