Coronavirus death toll shows no sign of easing

Greece’s National Organization for Public Health (EODY) on Monday reported 41 new Covid-related fatalities, which took the overall death toll since the start of the pandemic to 15,177.

EODY also reported 2,383 confirmed new infections, only eight of which were identified among incoming travelers, pointing to continued widespread transmission in the community.

The news is also bleak for the country’s hospitals, which have 331 Covid-19 patients on ventilators, pushing capacity at intensive care units close to 70%. What is even more troubling is the fact that the percentage of intubated patients who have been fully vaccinated against the virus has risen to 13.3% from 9.8% four weeks earlier.

Just over 80% of ICU patients have an underlying health problem and/or are aged 70 years old or more and nearly 87% are only partially or not at all vaccinated.

Monday’s 187 new hospitals admissions for Covid-19 were in line with the seven-day average of 186. The average age of new admissions is 39 years old, while for victims of the disease it is 78 years old. The EODY bulletin does not include data on the vaccination status of new admissions.

The latest figures show little improvement from previous weeks: On October 4, there were 2,125 cases, 36 deaths and 342 patients on ventilators (11% fully vaccinated). On September 27, EODY reported 2,130 new cases and 47 fatalities, with 323 intubated patients (9.6%). A week earlier, on September 20, Greece had 2,126 cases, 39 deaths and 342 patients in intensive care (8.5%), while a week before that it saw 1,608 cases, 51 deaths and 379 intubated patients (9.8% fully vaccinated).

Moreover, on August 11, EODY reported 3,475 cases and 19 fatalities, a sharp increase from July 11, when Greece had 1,465 new cases and five deaths.