Hong Kong faces shortage of beds amid flu outbreak
Hospitals in Hong Kong are facing a shortage of beds as the city is grappling with one of the deadliest strains of avian flu in recent years.
Above 90 percent of the Hong Kong’s intensive care units are full of patients with life-threatening conditions, Dr. Seamus Siu Yuk Leung of the Frontline Doctor’s Union said on Sunday.
There are merely 201 intensive care unit beds in Hong Kong, which make up only 1 percent of all beds in public hospitals run by the Hospital Authority.
Siu criticized the Hospital Authority for negligence in efforts to contain the epidemic.
Hong Kong’s Secretary of Food and Health Ko Wing-man has also expressed concern about the nearly full units. However, a spokeswoman for the Hospital Authority said authorities would take appropriate measures when necessary.
Siu added that doctors were under “immense pressure,” working 24-hour shifts to meet the patients’ demands. Under such circumstances, he added, some doctors fear getting strained, and are getting reluctant to work.
The flu outbreak started in Hong Kong on January 2. Some 214 patients were hospitalized following the epidemic, out of whom 140 have died as of Saturday.
Last winter, Hong Kong recorded 133 deaths and 266 reported cases of bird flu.
MIS/HJL/SS
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