Corsica: intensive care services overwhelmed, patients transferred to Brittany

The situation is deteriorating everywhere in France and particularly in Corsica where the incidence rate continues to increase very rapidly. It was located at 1,040 per 100,000 inhabitants the week of December 20-26, an increase of 60% from the previous week. The incidence rate is particularly high among 15-19 year olds and 20-39 year olds.

Faced with this strong viral circulation and overwhelmed hospitals which had already launched a call for reinforcement in mid-December, two patients were transferred by plane Wednesday to the Brest CHU for one and to the Morlaix hospital for the other.

Aged 45 and 63, these two patients are “unvaccinated, carriers of multiple comorbidities, suffering from a severe form of Covid-19, intubated-ventilated”, according to a press release from the ARS. This same source also ensures that the transfers were organized “given the saturation of the resuscitation services of the two island Covid referral hospitals”.

Indeed, according to the ARS of Corsica, no more beds in the Bastia hospital center are available. As of December 29 in the whole of Corsica, 92 patients were hospitalized, including 21 in intensive care. These hospitalizations particularly affect the oldest people. Indeed, the average age to date in conventional hospitalization is 68.3 years against 62.4 years for people in intensive care.

In addition, according to data from two hospitals on the island, located in Ajaccio and Bastia, 94% of patients hospitalized in intensive care, intensive care or critical care are not vaccinated or do not have a regimen. full. As of December 26, 73.3% of the Corsican population over 12 years old was vaccinated, against a vaccination rate of 76.6% throughout France, according to data from CovidTracker and the Ministry of Health.

The situation is therefore particularly worrying in Corsica since the hospital situation is already saturated even though the Omicron wave is still very little present on the island. As of December 29, 42 confirmed cases of the Omicron variant were detected there. However, if this Omicron variant seems a priori less dangerous, its strong contagiousness, three times greater than that of Delta, could lead to an explosion in the number of cases and mechanically, an increase in hospitalizations.