"In the last three weeks there has been a clear increase in the number of hospitalisations of child patients ranging from a few days to 15 or 16 years of age," acknowledges Dr. Joan Figuerola, head of pediatrics at Son Espases.
The cause is the "diseases caused by COVID, which we had not had with this frequency," explains the expert, indicating respiratory diseases and pneumonia. Yesterday in Son Espases hospital there were two patients in ICU aged 12 and 15 years respectively and ten others hospitalised on the ward. "We have bilateral pneumonias that we had not seen before, or they were not so serious, with the affected chest plate".
To get an idea of the evolution in these young patients, "in the whole pandemic we had had about 25 admissions and three weeks ago there were already ten," adds Figuerola. It was known that with the vaccination campaign among those over 12 years of age, the virus would affect children to a greater extent, "only they were left, and it seems that this is what has happened". Hence the importance of vaccinating the 5-11 age group because it is already known that the approved serums reduce the severity of the disease.
Yesterday the Balearic Islands notified another 4,103 new positives and at the moment there are 53,147 people with Covid. However, only 0.75 % of the cases are severe and require hospitalisation. There are 403 people hospitalised, 83 of whom occupy a critical care bed.
The accumulated incidence at 14 days stands at 2,815.4 cases per 100,000 inhabitants and "in our community we have not yet noticed a slowdown as in others", warned the Regional Minister of Health, Patricia Gómez.