COVID-19 cases in Germany rise

So far, 3405 people have lost their lives as a result of COVID-19 in Italy. The death rate in Italy is currently 8.3%. In Germany, official departments have reported 47 deaths, so the death rate is 0.3%. Here the question remains: Why is this difference in mortality rates despite the geographical proximity between the two countries?

The biggest problem is the overcrowding of Italian hospitals, especially the northern regions of the country still affected. The capabilities of medical facilities are so overburdened in so many places that doctors have to decide who stays and who is not. In Cremona, a town in the center of the Italian crisis zone in Lombardy, sick patients are treated in tents, depending on the severity of the disease *, it is decided who to treat.

According to tagesschau.de, the explanation for the difference between the two countries could be the frequency of the tests. In Germany more tests are done (up to 16,000 per week), which is why more infections are detected early. In Italy, 165,000 tests were performed as of March 18, 90,000 of them in the past week alone. Experts also believe that the virus may have spread unnoticed in Italy for a long time, which means a large number of unreported cases and according to the Lancet study, the first symptoms appear in deaths 18.5 days before death.

For Germany, this in turn may mean that the number of deaths can increase, as the virus has spread only for about three weeks. Hospitals in Germany must also change the way they deal with the situation to create capacity for patients. According to Bavarian Prime Minister Marcus Soder, “unnecessary operations will be delayed.”

By midnight, about 17,000 cases of power had been reported in Germany, about 3,000 more than the previous day. “But these are only the numbers that have been officially reported, and the number of real cases will always be higher,” said Wheeler Institute director Robert Koch. In the following image, we can see the distribution of injuries according to German cities.