Medical emergency services in Sofia on the edge of exhaustion, restrictions against Covid-19 expected to be stepped up

Sofia and the region are about to introduce a lock down due to the spread of coronavirus.

During the past 24 hours, the pressure on the medical establishments in the country remains high. 7,600 Covid-19 patients are in hospital.

On March 17, the number of daily cases is extremely high. Against this background, the medics from the Medical Emergency Service in Sofia are exhausted. At a briefing this morning, they appealed for compliance with the anti-epidemic measures and explained that they were on the end of their tether.

More than 4,300 new cases were reported in a single day on March 17 out of 19,214 tests. The positivity rate is 23% of all tested.

New restrictive measures are expected to be introduced in Sofia on Saturday, including the closure of kindergartens, nurseries, schools, shopping malls and restaurants.

Dr. Dancho Penchev, Head of Sofia Regional Health Inspectorate: At the moment there is no need for a Covid-19 curfew in Sofia

The medical professionals from the emergency units call on the public for strict observance of the measures. The reason is they are exhausted and the number of calls to them are increasing.

In just one week, 1,482 people with symptoms of Covid-19 had called in, with 129 of the calls being about children.

For the past 12 hours, the medical emergency service received about 500 calls, with 50 of them being for Covid-19 patients.

For the past year, the ambulance teams have been working in full mobilization. There are about 25-30 medical emergency teams in Sofia, but the workload is too big.. In just one year, 9 medics died. Some of the medical emergency specialist have been infected with Covid-19.

Nearly 1,500 calls about Covid-19 in just one week were made to the Emergency Service in Sofia

In the late afternoon, it is expected that there will be clarity about the new anti-epidemic measures, which are being discussed by the regional headquarters in the capital.