Patient numbers remain stable, 62 further deaths from COVID-19
At a press conference held at 11am on Monday the National Crisis Centre gave the latest figures on the novel coronavirus epidemic in Belgium.
· A further 62 deaths from COVID-19 have been reported during the past 24 hours. Of these 35 people died in hospital land 26 in care homes. This brings the total death toll in Belgium to 8,707.
· During the past 24 hours 60 new patients with COVID-19 have been admitted to hospital. 55 patients have been discharged. This leave 2,222 COVID-19 patients currently being cared for in Belgian hospitals.
· Of these 478 patients are on intensive care wards. This is 2 more than was the case a day ago. 299 patients are on ventilators.
· With a further 55 patients having been discharged from hospital during the past day, a total of 13,697 COVID-19 have been discharged from Belgian hospitals since mid-March.
· A further 368 people tested positive for COVID-19. This brings the total number of confirmed infections in Belgium to 53,449.
Speaking after having presented the figures, the virologist Steven Van Gucht said "The number of hospital admissions has stabilised. We are a good way under 100 per day”. Professor Van Gucht added that "On the intensive care wards we now even see a fall of 5% a day”. The fall in the number of confirmed new infections has stopped. However, there is a logical explanation for this. "We have changed our testing strategy which means that we are testing more widely."