Virus fight leaves medics exhausted and sick

Exhausted and sick health personnel is another reality of the spread of COVID-19, in Panama since it arrived on March 9.

Xavier Sáez-Llorens , an infectologist and member of the to Covid-19 Advisory Committee of the Ministry of Health (Minsa) to attend, revealed on  TVN that the exhaustion led to an “urgent” meeting with the health authorities.

He said that the medical and health personnel are exhausted and sick from Covid-19, a situation that, will force training new doctors, hire the unemployed and even bring foreign doctors to help while the health crisis lasts.

Despite the fatigue, the work carried out by medical and health personnel keep the country with the lowest case fatality rate in the world, a behavior that in his opinion shows “That they are sacrificing for something.”

Sáez-Llorens said we must begin to show the work that is done in hospitals, laboratories, and other settings to give the best care to those affected by Covid-19 because it is these professionals who are on the front line of care and are at risk of contagion.

The exhaustion produced by long working hours since the appearance of Covid-19 is a problem identified by leaders of associations of health professions The president of the National Association of Nurses, Ana Reyes de Serrano said they have already warned the Minister of Health, Rosario Turner, and the director of the Social Security Fund, Enrique Lau Cortés .

De Serrano explained that, after working 12 consecutive hours for more than 70 days, the nurses began to suffer problems in the muscles, bones and in the urinary system, in addition to contracting the disease.

She said that they do not know the number of members who contracted the disease, because the Ministry has not provided that figure, despite requests., Unofficially they place the figure of about 80 infected nurses. The guild has 6,623 members, of which 5,400  are active.

The coordinator of the National Negotiating Medical Commission, Domingo Moreno, said that the problem of staff exhaustion will not be solved in the short term; on the contrary, it is going to get worse with the challenge of more cases.