The surroundings of the Royal Free Hospital are surprisingly calm, this Tuesday, December 29. The car park in front of the emergency room of the main hospital in north-west London, a huge building with brutalist architecture, is almost empty. The surrounding streets are deserted, the shops all closed, apart from a Mark & Spencer and one or two upscale bakeries.
Appearances are deceptive: in semi-confinement, the British capital has once again become the epicenter of the coronavirus epidemic it was in the spring. Its inhabitants are now instructed not to leave their homes – except for shopping or exercise – due to re-containment. Only “essential stores” are open. And in the cold air, ambulance sirens sound continuously, as at the height of the first wave.
The situation on the epidemic front has sharply worsened over the past ten days in the United Kingdom, especially in London and in the south-east of England, relatively untouched so far by the second wave.
Monday, December 28, health authorities confirmed that the number of hospitalizations linked to the virus had for the first time exceeded the peak in April, with 20,426 people admitted to English institutions (including 5,300 in London). And on Tuesday, the bar of 53,000 new positive cases in the last twenty-four hours was crossed in the country. With 414 deaths in a single day, the death toll has climbed to more than 71,500 people who have died from Covid-19 in the country since March.
Galloping resumption of infection
“The situation is extremely worrying”, responded Susan Hopkins, head of the British National Health Agency. “The number of Covid patients in hospital has jumped 47% over the last seven days in London hospitals”, underlined the day before on Twitter Alastair McLellan, editor in chief of the specialized newspaper Health Service Journal. The “mutant” virus, detected shortly before Christmas in the south of England, is widely considered to be responsible for the galloping resumption of the infection: it is at least 50% more contagious. warning messages are increasing among nursing staff.
In recent days, the signals have in any case all turned red in the NHS – the British hospital system. Les tweets de Samantha Batt-Rawden, an intensive care doctor and president of the Doctors Association UK trade association, covered the media on Tuesday. “I chair a network of 46,000 British doctors. Things are really bad on the front line [dans les unités Covid-19], doctors need help. Hospitals start to run out of oxygen, one has only one ventilator, intensive care units call for volunteers to return patients [les mettre sur le ventre, afin de faciliter la respiration]. Please stay home! “
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