The place where being in hospital is worse than being sick

Another deadly hospital fire gripped Romania, the south eastern European nation which saw no fewer than 12 hospital fires in less than 12 months, writes Cristian Gherasim, Bucharest correspondent.

This is time, seven people died in the port city of Constanta, where ICU units treating COVID patients got engulfed by the killer blaze.

Since November last year, Romania’s hospitals have been plagued by 12 fires, some resulting in minor injuries, others, namely four, ending in tragedy with 31 dead.

An investigation is under way regarding the deadly blaze at the COVID hospital in Constanta, but amongst the first clues given by authorities are the fact that the hospital has been operating for 14 years without a fire permit and that it did not have a fire detection system. The direct cause is yet unknown, though previous investigations detected also faulty electrical installations, improvisations, overloads.

The interim Minister of Health, Cseke Attila, said that only after the cause of the fire will be found, the culprits will be identified.

Country president Klaus Iohannis said in a public stated that he is "terrified" by the tragedy in Constanța and claimed that "the Romanian state has failed in its fundamental mission to protect its citizens”.

In addition to poor management and poor maintenance, overcrowding of hospitals and ICU units is one of the causes leading to such tragedies. With a total record of over 11,000 daily Covid cases, Romania significantly outpaces both the European and world average, putting even more pressure on the ailing healthcare system. "Romania has 2.65 times more deaths than the European average and 6.34 times more deaths than the world average. Casualties in Romania represent 5% of worldwide COVID deaths, and 11.5 percent of those registered in Europe over the 24-hour period," reported CNCAV, the country's National Committee for the Co-ordination of Activities on Covid Vaccination.

These tragic events generate a perfect storm as the Romanian healthcare system is overwhelmed, with almost no ICU beds left, and long waiting times for Covid-testing and results.

Healthcare specialists have been warning for several weeks that the next Covid wave will hit the country hardest. Epidemiology expert Alexandru Rafila said that Romania has one of the highest contagion-rates in Europe. Valeriu Gheorghiță, leading the vaccination campaign, stated that by approximate the second-half of October, the number of Covid-19 cases in Romania could surpass 20,000 per day.

Romania's medical care has been consistently ranked EU's worst and most under-financed. Romania spends less on its medical system than any other EU country, as Eurostat ranks it last with only €400 healthcare expenditure per inhabitant, way behind top performers such as Luxembourg, Sweden and Denmark, each with over €5,000 health expenditure per inhabitant each year.

Romania has also one of the lowest vaccination-rates in the EU leading to even more severe cases flooding the healthcare system and in turn leading to even more such tragedies. According to data provided by officials, 52% of all Europeans are fully vaccinated. Fully-vaccinated Romanians, by comparison, amount to only 28 percent.

On top of a poorly managed health-care system, a plummeting vaccination rate, plies an ongoing political crises that has no end in sight and a myriad of social and economic crises needing immediate response.

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