Covid patients in Wigan hospital decreasing
Six weeks ago a third of hospital patients had Covid – now there are 30 in total
A third of patients admitted to hospitals in Wrightington, Wigan and Leigh six weeks ago had Covid – now there are just 30 and the death rate has declined.
Only 5 pc of patients now in these hospitals had been admitted with Covid.
But the number of patients currently on ventilators in critical care remains high – between 15 and 17, while normally there would be between seven and nine.
Dr Sanjay Arya, medical director at Wrightington, Wigan and Leigh NHS Foundation Trust, which runs the Royal Albert Edward Infirmary, told the health and wellbeing board on Wednesday (March 3) of the ‘great improvement’.
He said: “In the first phase of the pandemic, we had a very high death rate, but thankfully, with newer treatment and with newer ways of managing patients who needed oxygen therapy, our death rate has come down in the second phase of the pandemic and even further in the third phase of the pandemic.
“This is very positive and I would like to say, we must thank our Wigan residents and community for the role and part they took in getting the number of Covid positive patients down and in the uptake of Covid vaccination.
“The hospital looks much better placed as of the last few weeks than what it was a few weeks ago. It was very difficult and hard.”
Professor Kate Ardern, director of public health at Wigan council, confirmed the infection rate is reducing and remains relatively low among the over-60s.
But she described Covid transmission within the working age population as ‘stubborn’ and warned that the North West is seeing a slower rate of decline.
She praised the successful rollout of the vaccine with some words of caution.
She said: “The fact remains that the vaccine is great at protecting individuals in terms of reducing the risk of serious illness and indeed, thankfully, the risk of mortality.
“But what it doesn’t do – either the AZ vaccine, or the Pfizer vaccine, or indeed the Moderna vaccine which is about to come on stream – is reduce our ability to transmit the virus between each other.
“Even if you are vaccinated you still have the ability to infect somebody else.
“So in order to actually reduce the transmission rate, we need to continue with those public health measures.”
The Kent variant, which is 70 pc more transmissible than the original strain of Covid-19, now accounts for 93 pc of new infections in the borough, she added.
A Liverpool, Bristol and South African variant are also currently circulating in the North West, the director of public health said.
However, while these variants are ‘much more’ infectious, they are not more virulent, which means they are no more likely to cause serious illness or death.
Prof Ardern also said there are no signs the variants can create ‘viral escape’, which is to say, there is no evidence that the efficacy of the vaccine is reduced.
She also confirmed that the number of Covid deaths has ‘thankfully’ declined.