Consumer protection watchdog in Tatarstan: inevitable bigger incidence of viral infections and coronavirus
“The incidence remains high”
33,7% of adults have been vaccinated today in Tatarstan, while 60% should be immunised. However, this pace isn’t yet satisfactory, noted vice head of the Tatarstan office of Russia’s consumer rights protection watchdog Lyubov Avdonina. Due to this, the service still doesn’t plan to permit cafes and restaurants to operate after midnight, which was suspended in early July due to the tough situation with COVID-19.
“In August, though the numbers have stabilised a bit, we don’t yet see a tendency for improvement. The incidence remains high. This doesn’t yet allow us to reconsider starting granting permits again. There is also a low vaccination rate,” she said on 17 August.
Avdonina called the vaccination pace among college teachers, 77,5% of whom have been immunised, school and kindergarten staff, 58%, university teachers, 54%. 426 enterprises of Tatarstan received instructions from Russia’s consumer rights protection watchdog on vaccination, and 90% of them have already complied with them.
983,393 people have been vaccinated in Tatarstan today, 826,412 people have received the second dose, said Vice Minister of Health Care of the republic and head of Kazan’s Health Care Office Vladimir Zhavoronkov. He also made the number of pregnant women who have been vaccinated public, it is 17 people. Their state is carefully monitored, the representatives of the Health Care noted.
“Nowadays the vaccination rate has decreased, now it has stopped falling, we are at a specific level, 6,000 people are daily vaccinated. 18,000 people were immunised at the peak... But we don’t see an ongoing fall in the pace,” Zhavoronkov stressed.
High children incidence
At the same time, children started to get coronavirus more often, and the vice health care minister of Tatarstan named this a problem. Due to this, he recommended adults receive a vaccine, as children can carry the virus.
“Thank God, kids still have mild cases compared to adults, though the share of patients with a moderately severe case has also increased,” he said.
In answer to the question about the closure of a COVID-19 hospital in Children’s Hospital No. 1, Zhavoronkov emphasised that this didn’t mean the number of beds reduced. For instance, the hospital in Children’s Republican Clinical Hospital was expanded.
“There is a sufficient number of beds. We don’t have any problems with hospitalisation. There are several hospitals for those children who tested both positive and negative but with similar symptoms. There is a provisional hospital in the hospital for infectious diseases for kids from one year. The task is to make a diagnosis for children there. If this isn’t COVID-19 but a banal viral respiratory infection, the patient doesn’t need hospitalisation, we take him to Children’s Hospital No. 7 and Children’s Unit in Polyclinic No. 18. If a kid tested positive, we take him to Children’s Republican Clinical Hospital. Children under year go to Children’s Hospital for Infectious Diseases for diagnostics on Okolnaya Street,” noted Zhavoronkov and claimed the Health Care Ministry doesn’t fear 1 September to provide primary care.”
Inevitable rise in incidence
In reply to the question if there would be a fourth wave after the third wave of coronavirus, Lyubov Avdonina reminded the audience that COVID-19 is wave-shaped.
“On the threshold of the upcoming autumn and winter period, a rise in the incidence of acute viral respiratory infections, including the novel coronavirus infection, is inevitable. The rise, the number of cases, its explosive or smooth character depends on us, how fast we will be vaccinated, firstly, against the new coronavirus infection, secondly, against the flu because this incident is common. And if now we see waves, as you call them, of the new coronavirus infection, a piece of our traditional acute respiratory infections, which total some 900 types, will join that tip of the iceberg,” Avdonina warned citizens.