This week’s booze binge has set SA back in its fight against Covid-19.Across the country, a massive surge of people in hospital emergency rooms with alcohol-related injuries has put additional strain on health-care numbers and filled up ICU beds needed for Covid-19 patients.
Professor Elmin Steyn, Tygerberg Hospital’s head of surgery and the trauma unit, said alcohol plus Covid-19 “massively” reduced access to medical care for others.
“Patients having to wait for surgeries end up having to go to ICU. The problem is the ICU beds are filled with gravely ill Covid-19 patients,” she said….more