At least 50 users and eleven employees of the Nossa Senhora da Conceição home (Casa da Caridade), in Ponte de Lima, are infected with covid-19. The information was transmitted to O MINHO by the chairman of the board, Agostinho Freitas.
After two users had tested positive last Friday, after going to the hospital emergency room, the health authority had all 68 users and 33 employees of that ERPI tested, with the results to be known during this Tuesday.
“Of the 68 users, 50 are infected and seven more tests are yet to arrive”, informed the president to our newspaper, calling this outbreak a “crazy thing”, since all of them are asymptomatic, according to the official.
“At this moment, a space has already been created within our facilities to accommodate those who have tested negative, while those who are positive remain in their rooms without contact with the outside”, explains Agostinho Freitas.
The official does not want to go into drama, despite the number “scare”. “They are all well, which is strange, because in a few days a situation like this appears to us and no one knows where the virus came from”, he adds.
In addition to the users, 33 employees were also tested, with a third also positive and unable to contribute to the work at home during the next 14 days.
“This situation with employees is complicated because we do not have enough human resources to deal with day-to-day activities, but tomorrow, at 10:00 am, we will have an emergency meeting in the Ponte de Lima Chamber with civil protection to to see the best way to deal with all this ”, said the chairman.
In addition to users and employees, the health authority asked for tests for the president himself, for the vice president, for the secretary and for the technical director of the home, for having been in contact with the employees in the past few days. All of these tests were negative.
Agostinho Freitas calls for calm on the part of civil society, since everyone is asymptomatic and without complaints because of covid.
“Without panic, without alarmists, we have a controlled situation in terms of accommodation. Employees go to a room, use personal protective equipment, and when they go to another room, they wear new equipment again, ”he says.
“We hope that everything will fade away, because 50 users contaminated like that are suddenly very strange”, he concludes.
The municipality of Ponte de Lima rose from 147 to 159 in the covid-19 case record between Friday and Monday.
Twelve more were infected with covid-19 during those three days, accounting for 51 active cases of the virus in the municipality, according to data collected by O MINHO from the Local Health Unit of Alto Minho.
These 63 new cases should only enter the accounts of next Friday, when ULSAM returns to disclose the cases in the municipality.
The municipality of Limiano has 106 recovered from the disease.
In the accumulated total, on Monday there were 159 cases of infection since the beginning of the pandemic.
At the district level, Alto Minho had, this Monday, 478 active cases, 66 deaths and 1,064 recovered.
The district has 1,608 cases accumulated since the beginning of the pandemic.
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