To relieve the Unified Health System (SUS), which was once again pressured by the rise in Covid-19 cases due to the Ômicron variant, the federal government authorized, this Thursday (27), the maintenance of more than 14 thousand ICU beds for Brazilian states and the Federal District.
The ordinance, which will be valid until February 28, was signed by the Minister of Health, Marcelo Queiroga, during the meeting that included representatives of the Health Departments of states and municipalities. The meeting aimed to assess the scenario of the pandemic.
In addition to maintaining the 14,000 beds, which would be demobilized early next week, the Ministry of Health promised to reopen 6,500 new ICU vacancies for March 1st. The measure seeks to avoid further pressure from public hospitals for the Ômicron variant.
“We are committed to providing the best possible support to all states and municipalities so that we can bring an increasingly better SUS to the population. the minister [Queiroga] is always asking about beds, he is very concerned about the lack of beds for the population”, said Adriana Teixeira Melo, director of the Department of Hospital, Home and Emergency Care (DAHU), an agency linked to the Ministry of Health.
The maintenance of Covid-19 beds for Brazilian states was considered by the federal government based on a formal request made, last Sunday (23), by the National Forum of Governors. The negotiations were headed by the governor of Piauí and president of the Forum of Governors, Wellington Dias. On the side of the federal government, those at the forefront of the conversations are the Minister of the Civil House, Ciro Nogueira and the executive secretary of the Ministry of Health, Rodrigo Cruz.
“Vaccination is essential to solve the pandemic”, said Queiroga
During the meeting, Marcelo Queiroga reinforced the need for vaccination against Covid-19 to put an end to the pandemic. He also highlighted the importance of the booster dose for maintaining immunity against the virus.
“We need to continue supporting the vaccination campaign. We must make an effort to increase the vaccination coverage of the second dose and the booster dose, because it will be fundamental to solve the issue of the pandemic”, highlighted the Minister of Health.
Queiroga also said he was following the epidemiological scenario in Europe to understand the behavior of the Ômicron variant.
“With the vaccination profile that Brazil has, I believe that the impact of Ômicron in Brazil is similar to what happened in the United Kingdom, Portugal and Spain, where cases exploded, but there was no strong increase in deaths. This is what we want in Brazil, that deaths do not rise. That’s what we’re rooting for,” he said.
Reference: CNN Brasil
