Intensive care units in Brussels are full, a city health official warned today.
“All intensive care units in Brussels are at their maximum capacity,” Inge Neven of the Brussels Health Inspectorate told the broadcaster VRT.
According to government data, 188 COVID-19 patients are currently in ICU units in Brussels.
Brussels hospitals have sent 278 patients to medical facilities outside of the city since the start of October, according to local media.
Belgium’s Hospital & Transport Surge Capacity advisory body warned on Sunday that the country only had 109 intensive care beds left. It ordered hospitals to create an additional 800 beds, which would up the country’s total to 2,800.
Belgium has hit another grim milestone. Across the country, more than 7,000 coronavirus patients are currently in the hospital — the highest since the pandemic hit. Of those, 1,302 are in the ICU.
Coronavirus cases shot up in Belgium in October, but now the rate of new infections is easing. The seven-day average dropped from 15,582 to 15,071 new cases overnight. “The express train is still racing, but slowing down,” virologist Steven Van Gucht told VRT.
Prime Minister Alexander De Croo imposed a lockdown starting this week, which is set to last until December.