WILLEMSTAD - The Curaçao Medical Center (CMC) makes an urgent appeal to the residents not to go to the emergency room of the hospital without first consulting a doctor. Ingemar Merkies, doctor and medical director of the CMC, made this plea during a virtual press conference on Sunday.
Merkies gives several reasons why people should not go to the emergency room of their own accord:
Firstly, there has recently been an abundance of patients who report to the ER without consulting their GP. According to the medical director, 96 percent of the visitors to the ER are sent home because it turns out that they are not emergency cases.
Second, according to Merkies, it is an extra challenging task during the COVID pandemic to provide assistance at the ER. Many patients with COVID symptoms also come to the emergency room and many staff members have now also been infected with the COVID-19 virus.
The result is that there is less capacity in the emergency room, but also that patients who do not have COVID-19 will still contract the virus.
Merkies therefore advises that people first turn to their own GP. Only when he or she makes a reference to the ER can people go there.