The WDR has a majority of the 53 health departments in NRW asked: Are you currently able to quickly follow up the corona cases? How is your digital equipment?
The surprising result: although some health authorities are still working with faxes, they say that they still manage to quickly follow up the contact – even health authorities with more than 200 cases per 100,000 inhabitants in seven days, for example in the Höxter district, in Gelsenkirchen and in Oberbergischen Circle.
Survey: Three out of 29 health authorities take longer than a day
Nearly 90 percent of the 29 health departments that answered the WDR questions say they can get the contact tracing within 24 hours or even “without delay“create – as long as infected people provide the correct contact details. Only three of the 29 health authorities surveyed state that they sometimes need two or three days.
Nevertheless, the incidence target of 50 per 100,000 will continue to be pursued, confirmed the Ministry of Labor, Health and Social Affairs to the WDR. Because the contact follow-up with the currently high case incidences requires the effort “of all the resources available in the health authorities and often the mobilization of additional forces from the administration and support from external parties, for example the Bundeswehr“. These “extreme stress“must be reduced as soon as possible.
Quarantine causes delay in Bielefeld
There was a current development on Friday in Bielefeld: According to WDR research, ten employees had to be quarantined there due to a positive Corona case. Due to limited work opportunities in the home office, there was a delay in reporting the number of cases. Bielefeld’s Lord Mayor Pit Clausen promises organizational changes in a letter to NRW Health Minister Laumann in order to avoid similar situations in the future.
The State Ministry of Health responded in writing: The reports from Bielefeld could only partially explain the problem. The reporting problems are not acceptable. The Ministry ordered that Bielefeld be monitored by the State Health Center for at least 14 days.
One reason for the faster average tracking is that most infected people are because of the Lockdowns have few contacts at the moment. But: If work could be completely digital, contact tracking would be faster, even with more contacts.
–
