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Date Published: 13/01/2022
ARCHIVED - Alicante nursing home outbreaks double post-Cristmas
64 elderly residences in Alicante province currently have active Covid cases
Covid outbreaks at nursing homes in Alicante province have doubled since Christmas, though symptoms are said to be mild due to vaccination.
A combination of the new variant Omicron and Christmas celebrations have led to a surge in new infections amongst residents and staff, the majority of whom spent the festive period with family or friends.
In just three weeks, the number of outbreaks in nursing homes across the province hiked from 31 on December 20 2021 to 64 on Wednesday January 12, according to data from the Regional Ministry of Health.
But thanks largely to the vaccine, most of the cases detected are mild, although three elderly residents who contracted the virus have died in the last 21 days. It's not clear if they lived at the same facility.
The Ministry has also stressed that in some cases there have been hospital admissions of elderly patients who have underlying health issues or long-standing illnesses.
However, according to the sector's employers' association Aerte, the majority of infections in homes over the last three weeks have been amongst members of staff, not residents.
"The most common scenario has been that a member of staff has gone on holiday for a few days and has been reunited with the family. On their return, they have taken a test and it has come back positive," explained Aerte president, José María Toro.
But he added that cases are also occurring amongst the elderly, in particular those who have gone out for lunch or dinner with the family over the holidays, which is why the employers' association had asked before Christmas for some kind of limitation on outings.
"We knew that the measure we were proposing was very tough, but we were facing a very complicated cocktail as this holiday season has brought together many people from other communities and even from other countries, all with a high circulation of the virus"," added Toro.
The Regional Ministry of Health protocol states that just one positive case of Covid is enough for an elderly nursing or residential home to be considered to have an outbreak, and for appropriate measures to be put in place to stop further contagion.
These measures are not lifted until 20 days after the last infection, and once the outbreak is under control, there are no restrictions on visits or outings.
In addition, the regional government continues to force elderly centres to reserve 5% of accommodation to isolate positive cases, which means that hundreds of places cannot be used, "despite the deficit in this type of resource".
Last September, the Ministry of Health began to vaccinate residents of nursing homes in the Valencia region with third doses and the incidence amongst people aged 70 to 79 stands at 888 cases per 100,000 inhabitants compared to 4,700 cases amongst people in their 20s.
Since the end of March 2021, 17 residents of elderly nursing homes have died in the province.
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