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# third wave
921 now in hospital with Covid-19 as patient numbers exceed April 2020 peak
On 15 April, 881 people with Covid-19 were in hospital.
THERE ARE NOW 921 people hospitalised with Covid-19, a figure topping the previous peak of 881 in hospital in mid-April.
Hospitalisations peaked at 881 on 15 April last year during the first wave of the Covid-19 pandemic.
CEO of the HSE Paul Reid said on Twitter that “everyone gets how serious this is now”.
Reid said there are now 75 people in ICU, a drop of one patient since figures released yesterday evening.
Yesterday, the HSE national director of acute operations Liam Woods said the HSE faces pressures every year, but in his experience, none have been to the scale of the current Covid-19 situation.
“Normally, it would be what would be known as trolley pressures and indeed flu, and the incidence of flu,” Woods said on RTÉ radio’s Morning Ireland.
“There is basically no flu of any significant level, or at all, recorded through the Virus Reference Laboratory at the moment, and trolley levels are historically low but a very poor indicator.
“No, in the time I’m working in the acute operations area which is six years within the HSE, I haven’t seen a threat at this scale growing this quickly. And so that’s why we’re responding in the way we are,” he said.
ICU consultant at University Hospital Limerick, Dr Catherine Motherway, said intensive care units “expect to see increased numbers as admissions continue to come in”.
“If we can stop ourselves getting [the virus] before now, we will see the end of this hopefully by the end of the year,” Motherway said speaking on RTÉ’s Morning Ireland.
She described the possible situation of how healthcare would run if hospitals start running out of available beds and resources.
She said “different ethics” are established in these situations where workers have to look towards “saving the most lives as opposed to treating the sickest first”.
However, she said this is not the current situation and it “will not happen if we stop this disease now”.
“None of us want to be there and none of us will be there if we control virus transmission in the community.”
