Georgian healthcare specialists: anti-corona measures insufficient, must be changed to avoid more dire consequences

The anti-epidemic measures taken by the state are insufficient to curb the spread of the pandemic and need significant changes, otherwise the country will face a dramatically difficult period, says the announcement of a group of Georgian healthcare specialists.

In the last seven days, Georgia stands in 16th place in the world in terms of the average death toll per 100,000 inhabitants,” says the announcement. 

The number of daily cases is increasing; however, the number of daily tests is not proportionally increasing. This makes us think that given the clinically detected cases of COVID-19, the actual number of cases is higher in the country than it is confirmed by laboratory research and is officially recorded,” say the medical experts.

Some of the steps the experts urge to be taken are:

• Strengthen the management mechanism of the epidemic response measures in the country
• To move the management of the pandemic from political struggle to national interests
• Establish a temporary national mechanism with maximum involvement of stakeholders, which will strengthen public trust and support, combine the best resources in the country to overcome the epidemic
• Clearly separate responsibilities and tighten enforcement discipline
• Reduce the need to turn to the medical system to prevent a collapse in the delivery of medical care
• Create / update a technical algorithm for patient behavior
•  Implement real-time monitoring, live consultations with the help of the website
• Improve the quality of public information / communication

The healthcare experts who signed the announcement are Akaki Zoidze, Levan Koberidze, Gigi Tsereteli, Zurab Chiaberashvili and others.

The announcement was released by the Economic Policy Research Center (EPRC) and the USAID Good Governance Initiative (GGI).

Photo: government of Georgia press office.

Georgian Prime  Minister Giorgi Gakharia met healthcare sector representatives today including some of the experts who signed the announcement to discuss the epidemiological situation of the country.

They discussed the steps which might be taken in order to avoid overcrowding of the hospital sector so as not to leave people who primarily need medical services out of the clinic. For that, it was decided that patients with severe health conditions will continue treatment in hospital, while patients with light health conditions will be treated at home or in so-called coronavirus hotels.

It was noted at the meeting that additional measures will be taken where it is needed. However, it was said that an announcement of the lockdown across the whole country is not planned.

Georgia has reported 3,117 new cases of coronavirus, 3,638 recoveries and 45 deaths in the past 24 hours. 

16,219 individuals remain infected with Covid-19 in Georgia as of today. 

Georgia has had 85,952 cases of coronavirus since February 26, 2020.

Since then 68,929 individuals have recovered, while 778 others have died. 

5,662 patients are undergoing treatment in hospitals as of today. 740 of the 5,662 patients are in critical condition. 332 of the 740 critical patients are on artificial ventilation.