9 a.m .: Employees of the Würzburg Health Department on Christmas and New Year’s Eve
The end of 2021 was also shaped by the current corona development in the region. With a value of just under 170, the 7-day incidence for the district of Würzburg on Christmas Eve was lower than in previous days, but on January 5th it reached a value of 310.4 again. This continues to cause a very high burden in the health department of the city and district of Würzburg. As the Würzburg district office reports, the work in the investigative teams did not rest on the holidays either. The employees there are responsible for contacting positive people after positive PCR tests. “Of course, our goal was and still is to quickly reach all people who tested positive. This of course also applies to weekends and holidays. This is the only way to prevent chains of infection from developing in the first place or to effectively break them,” emphasizes Sarah Eitelwein who, among other things, coordinates the work of the investigative teams in the health department for the city and district of Würzburg.
In the period from December 24, 2021 to January 1, 2022, employees of the health department contacted more than 850 people who tested positive. This resulted in around 1,800 contacts being made in this context. Because of the rapidly expanding Omikron variant, the health department often had to call index people twice, as determining the variant using the vPCR process took two days and there were many queries and special inquiries by email. On the holidays, an average of 25 people were on duty, of which an average of around 15 were investigators – but also doctors, social medicine specialists – for the facilities and daycare / school teams -, test management staff and hygiene inspectors for access and reporting the data. The investigators consisted of our own staff, colleagues from the city of Würzburg and the Bundeswehr.
There are currently around 80 test sites in the city and district of Würzburg. These were used particularly often, especially before the holidays. The test management at the district office therefore draws a positive conclusion: “We are pleased that many citizens have made use of the numerous test options in order to protect themselves and their loved ones as best as possible on Christmas and New Year’s Eve,” emphasizes Paul Justice, who is in charge of test management responsible. On December 31, 2021 alone, the test center at the Talavera counted 240 PCR tests. In all of 2021, more than 217,000 PCR tests were struck off at the Talavera.
“Although we had to bring bad news to the public during the holidays, we perceived the citizens we contacted as understanding and very cooperative. Of course, a lot of educational work is necessary, as there is great uncertainty among the population due to the spread of omicrons But we are happy to do work to be able to continue fighting the pandemic, “emphasizes Sarah Eitelwein.
Dr. Barbara Finkenberg, deputy head of the health department, expects the number of cases to continue to rise due to the more contagious Omikron variant. In order to counteract it, it is important to be vaccinated and tested regularly, to consistently comply with the AHA + L rules and to limit contacts as much as possible.
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