‘Second COVID wave has broken us’, shadow minister says frontliners facing burn-out

The Nationalist Party’s shadow health minister Stephen Spiteri has warned that Malta’s health services are on the brink due to the rising increase in COVID cases and ITU admissions.

Spiteri said Mater Dei Hospital was facing an overload in COVID infections, and that hospital services were finding it difficult to keep up with the rising cases.

“This is especially felt inside the ITU and the cardiac units (CCU) and medical wards,” Spiteri, a GP, said. “Doctors and nurses are doing their best to keep up, but the frontline is burnt out and exhausted, and finding it difficult to keep up.”

Spiteri said MDH capacity was “on the brink up” and showing signs that the spread of COVID-19, at an average of over 200 cases a day, is no longer under control. “These numbers are exaggerated,” Spiteri said.

He called for measures to be taken by the Public Health Superintendent. “Emergency surgeries are being delayed and waiting times have increased in immediate care units and those handling acute heart attacks and other diseases requiring immediate attention.”

Spiteri ITU workers who had spoken to him said they were seeing the highest rate of admissions to the intensive therapy unit ever since the pandemic started.

“This is a red alert. The number of patients on ventilators is a parameter for the decisions that must be taken. ITU staff tell me they saw this coming since September 2020, because it was a red alert back then. The second wave has broken us.”