The closure of schools for a week and the introduction of a rapid test for admission to public transport was proposed by the director of the second ICU of the hospital ’Papanikolaou«, Nikos Capravelos, asked to comment on the Omicron variant of the new coronavirus.
«My proposal in order not to close the market and have a black Christmas, is to make some interventions that have been made in Europe. To close schools for a week, something like winter break, and tighten up the protocol for when to close a department when there are outbreaks coronavirus, not to be the 50%», he stressed, speaking to SKAI.
«The Germans say if you don't have rapid test you do not enter the public transport and I say apply it to Greece now. To lock ourselves up when we have a vaccine available would be ridiculous,» he said. At the same time, he reiterated the extension of mandatory vaccinations, especially to citizens over 60 years old, who are the ones who flood ICUs.
«Need to take action»
Speaking about the Omicron variant of the coronavirus, Kapravelos said that the concern in the scientific world is whether vaccines cover it.
Speaking about the situation in the hospitals, Nikos Kapravelos pointed out that the on-call duty of the hospital «Papanikolaou» on Sunday was very difficult, although fewer admissions were recorded, around 50 compared to the previous on-call duty that reached 70. «But the admissions are over 110 in a continuous flow which means the dispersion in the community is huge. We don't see that wave being stopped. We have gone back many years when we were intubating patients outside the ICU,» he pointed out.
