Djerlek: Relaxing of measures when there's less than 100 new daily cases. Appeal ahead of holidays

Photo: Tanjug/Rade Prelic

The numbers are encouraging, we currently, after a few weeks, have fewer hospital admissions than discharges. However, we still have about 5,000 patients in hospitals, and 171 patients are on ventilators due to coronavirus. These are high numbers after all. We can talk about a more relaxed situation when we have less than 100 (newly) infected people on a daily basis, and for that we still need a lot of struggle and time, State Secretary in the Ministry of Health Mirsad Djerlek has told RTS.

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Mirsad Djerlek said that the numbers that indicate a decline in the number of coronavirus infections are encouraging, but also binding, and assessed that epidemiological measures and mass immunization are still needed.

"The numbers are encouraging, we currently, after a few weeks, have fewer admissions than discharges. During yesterday, we had about 2,530 Covid examinations, and about 20 days ago we had between 4,000 and 5,000. However, we still have about 5,000 patients in hospitals, and 171 patients are on ventilators. These are high numbers after all. We can talk about a more relaxed situation when we come to the point where we have fewer than 100 infected people on a daily basis, and for that we still need a lot of struggle and time," explains Djerlek.

He stressed that despite the fall in the number of patients, it is not the right time to relax and appealed on citizens to adhere to the measures during the upcoming holidays as well.

"When we hear such encouraging news, we relax too much and then pay the price for that relaxation. During the holidays, the weather will be nice and people will go out into the nature, but I appeal on them to avoid contacts that can contribute to infection," said Djerlek.

He stated that during the holidays, the controls will be stricter, there will be a large number of inspectors in the field who will control hospitality establishments, gardens, picnic areas, public transport.

"We truly have to protect the health of citizens, and the only way is for inspectors to control whether epidemiological measures are respected, as well as everything that is in force at the moment," he explains.

Speaking about vaccination, he said that the largest number of vaccinated people are in Belgrade, Nis and Uzice, and the least in Tutin, Novi Pazar and Lajkovac.

He added that the lowest vaccination numbers are among the young.

"Social networks have done a great evil by affecting our young people because they primarily talked about sterility, which we have shown through our most eminent experts that coronavirus causes sterility, not the vaccine. Immunologists and people who deal with this problem have correctly made it known that the vaccine does not affect reproductive organs," says Djerlek.

(Telegraf.rs)