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Italian Hospitals Collapse: Over 1,100 Patients Waiting to be Admitted in Rome
Euronews ^ | 05/01/2024

Posted on 01/05/2024 1:12:19 PM PST by nickcarraway

The worst situation is in Rome and its region, where more than 1,100 patients are waiting to be admitted, according to the Italian Society of Emergency Medicine and Urgent Care.

Just a few days ago, ambulances were queuing outside hospitals in Rome. In other regions, such as Lombardy, patients are crammed into waiting rooms until a bed becomes available.

In cities such as Turin, hospital overcrowding has even led to a shortage of stretchers for patients.

Emergency departments in Italian hospitals are in chaos and on the verge of collapse.

The worst situation is in Rome and its region, where more than 1,100 patients are waiting to be admitted, according to the Italian Society of Emergency Medicine and Urgent Care (Simeu).

"We are trying to guarantee the service, but we are in an extremely difficult situation," Simeu president Fabio de Laco explained.

According to Simeu, the number of patients waiting in Piedmont has reached some 500, while in Lombardy and its capital, Milan, normal hospital admissions have been suspended in order to "free up" some beds for emergencies.

What is behind the hospital collapse?

The rise in hospital admissions, which has put pressure on the Italian health system, is due to an increase in "respiratory diseases, especially among the elderly".

"Covid has slightly decreased in the last week, flu is spreading, but other viruses have also caused 'overcrowding' in hospitals and a very strong pressure on emergency services," De Laco explained on Tuesday, according to local media.

In fact, in the week before Christmas, from December 18 to 24, "the influenza epidemic curve showed an incidence value never reached in previous seasons," according to the latest epidemiological bulletin from the Higher Institute of Health.

And the situation is far from stabilising, according to the Italian agency itself.

"Several regions have activated plans to combat overcrowding in hospitals and health companies in order to find additional beds, but since hospital beds are chronically scarce, in practice there is nothing else to do but take beds away from other specialties, such as surgery. Of course, this does not solve the problem," De Laco said.

As the situation worsens, doctors are becoming exhausted and there are a number of alarming articles in the Italian press: "Hospitals on the brink" was one headline in La Repubblica.

No rest for doctors

The president of the Simeu has pointed out that many doctors in Italy's public health system have not been able to rest over Christmas and New Year.

Holidays are a "luxury", he said, citing the Piedmontese capital as an example: "In Turin, for example, we didn't count on holidays over the Christmas period" and "the vast majority of doctors worked without interruption throughout the period".

Experts have urged Italians to get vaccinated, as the peak of influenza - expected next week when schools reopen after the holidays - has not yet been reached.

UK junior doctors stage longest-ever strike in NHS history over pay dispute Regional councillors from the centre-left Democratic Party, Massimiliano Valeriani and Emanuela Droghei, visited two hospitals in the capital on Tuesday, the Umberto I and Sant'Andrea polyclinics, where they found a "very complex" situation due to the "large number of patients".

Both complained of "blocked ambulances, postponed operations, clogged emergency rooms and beds blocked by covid patients, all because of a vaccination campaign that started late".


TOPICS:
KEYWORDS: disease; europe; flu; italy; medicine; socializedmedicine
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To: Wuli

RSV was rarely seen in adults prior to covid shots. Now it’s a lot more frequent. Wonder why?


21 posted on 01/05/2024 1:41:32 PM PST by Clay Moore (My pistol identifies as a cordless hole punch. )
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To: nickcarraway

Sounds like all the Chinese expats returned to Italy after their holiday visits to China.


22 posted on 01/05/2024 1:48:01 PM PST by ProtectOurFreedom (“Occupy your mind with good thoughts or your enemy will fill them with bad ones.” ~ Thomas More)
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To: thegagline
I live in Sicily. The health care here is phenomenal. Excellent doctors, modern facilities and a warm, human touch. You get seen very quickly in even an mild emergency. But alas, the bureaucracy, the incompetent administrators (nepotism) are a nightmare.

There has been a strong flu going around. Or is it COVID? Or is it actually the flu? Simply miraculous that the flu, which had disappeared here while Covid was supposedly running rampant the last few years, has magically reappeared here.

23 posted on 01/05/2024 1:56:38 PM PST by Rocco DiPippo (Either the Deep State destroys America or we destroy the Deep State. -Donald Trump)
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To: mikey_hates_everything

Unlike America, right? Lol!


24 posted on 01/05/2024 1:57:24 PM PST by Rocco DiPippo (Either the Deep State destroys America or we destroy the Deep State. -Donald Trump)
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To: nickcarraway

I didn’t say that. What is happening in Italy will happen here too after admitting the sick invaders.


25 posted on 01/05/2024 1:57:42 PM PST by 353FMG
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To: nickcarraway

>>> all because of a vaccination campaign that started late”.

So the UK doctors are complaining about being overworked due to not enough “vaccines” soon enough.

I call BS.

The doctors who could have prevented this were fired for speaking out AGAINST the “vaccinations”!

These IDIOT doctors are getting what they asked for.


26 posted on 01/05/2024 1:59:13 PM PST by Safrguns
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To: Rocco DiPippo

The US is still a babe in the woods.


27 posted on 01/05/2024 2:04:30 PM PST by mikey_hates_everything
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To: Rocco DiPippo
I live in Sicily. The health care here is phenomenal. Excellent doctors, modern facilities and a warm, human touch. You get seen very quickly in even an mild emergency. But alas, the bureaucracy, the incompetent administrators (nepotism) are a nightmare.

Thank you for the insight. As an aside, I watched the Mafia Only Kills in Summer series. It is about Palermo during the 1970 as seen through the eyes of a child. It sort of had a bittersweet Il Postino vibe to it.

28 posted on 01/05/2024 2:05:37 PM PST by thegagline (Sic semper tyrannis! Goldwater in 2024)
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To: Clay Moore

It was always around with most infections in infants & oddlers and the elderly. And, it always had years it waxed and years it waned.

It might have surged after Covid because a lot of people’s immune systems were lowered during all the lockdowns.

Immune systems that are isolated don’t make as many small encounters by which the immune system is improved.


29 posted on 01/05/2024 2:07:47 PM PST by Wuli
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To: ProtectOurFreedom

Yes . The Italians haven’t rid Milan
of that menace.
these dirty infected Chinese invaded again and Italy allowed it . fools


30 posted on 01/05/2024 2:15:28 PM PST by ncalburt ( Gop DC Globalists are the evil ones)
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To: JayGalt; All

I watched a couple of interviews with Geert Vander Bosch (sp.), a virologist, from Belgium,I think, -very upset about JN.1.

I am not good with accents, but what I got was that this variant was doing something different than the prior variants that terrified him.

My explanation is pretty rough - he thinks this variant has the potential to seriously harm and kill many people because it bypasses the Covid spike proteins, and go after t ells, or something, and the damaged immune systems (caused by the jabs) can’t then fight off the opportunistic infections that set in.

This looks like he might be right, and he made it very clear that he didn’t want to be right. It is worth hunting him up to double check my understanding of what he explained… I hope he is wrong, of course. He thought we would know soon if it was going to happen, and now this report seems to me to support his fears.


31 posted on 01/05/2024 2:48:53 PM PST by jacquej ("You cannot have a conservative government with a liberal culture." (Mark Steyn))
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To: thegagline

My cousin is a minister and has lived in Italy since 1973. They’re real snooty about the wonderfulness of Italy. But whenever there’s a major medical issue, they’re beating cheeks back to the good ol’ US of A for treatment.


32 posted on 01/05/2024 2:57:04 PM PST by MayflowerMadam ("A coward dies a thousand times before his death, but the valiant taste of death but once.")
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To: thegagline
Lots of Mafia violence in Palermo back then. After the Mafia murdered Falcone and Borsellino, the public outrage against the Mafia exploded, forcing an end to most of the overt violence. Now the Mafia in Sicily is low key - they make most of their cash though public contracts and the cement and trash industries.

Of course it still controls drugs and prostitution and a lot of politicians here. But the days of murdering shopkeepers who refuse to pay protection money are over.

Sicily is very safe now and very Old School. I do miss some things about living in the US but all in all I love it here. No DEI, no LGBTXYZ and no lunatic ferals running amok.

33 posted on 01/05/2024 3:05:26 PM PST by Rocco DiPippo (Either the Deep State destroys America or we destroy the Deep State. -Donald Trump)
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To: nickcarraway

Are these the same fake pictures and reports foisted on the world from 2020?


34 posted on 01/05/2024 3:10:57 PM PST by RetiredTexasVet (We used to be a Republic, we are now a Fascist Klepto-Thugocracy.)
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To: nickcarraway

Vax. Clear the way for the trees.


35 posted on 01/05/2024 3:19:45 PM PST by If You Want It Fixed - Fix It ( )
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To: LRoggy

If you buy a leather jacket made in Italy, many factories are not only owned by the Chinese but also worked in by the Chinese. Many of these are the people who returned to Italy after spending 2020 Chinese New Year in China and brought with them COVID-19.


36 posted on 01/05/2024 3:19:54 PM PST by Freee-dame
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To: nickcarraway

What percent jabbed are Italians?


37 posted on 01/05/2024 3:21:01 PM PST by Jane Long (What we were told was a conspiracy theory in ‘20 is now fact. Land of the sheep, home of the knaves)
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To: nickcarraway

When the immigration backlash comes, and it will, it won’t be pretty.


38 posted on 01/05/2024 4:00:53 PM PST by Mariner (War Criminal #18)
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To: Gaffer
I see Italy is back at their “triage” again. In this case Triage means “let old people die.”

What is the correct thing to do when 10 people need life-saving treatment but there is only capacity to treat 7?
39 posted on 01/05/2024 4:09:57 PM PST by Reynoldo (BurnLootMurder)
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To: nickcarraway

One would almost think there was a US Election cycle coming up.


40 posted on 01/05/2024 4:33:27 PM PST by rlmorel ("The stigma for being wrong is gone, as long as you're wrong for the right side." (Clarice Feldman))
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