AMSTERDAM - The National Institute for Public Health and the Environment (RIVM) registered 76,790 positive coronavirus tests in the past seven days. For the fifth week in a row, the number of new cases has risen by about 40 percent.
In over a year and a half, the RIVM only once reported a higher total number. That happened on December 22 last year, when the institute announced that 82,340 infections were diagnosed in seven days. If the number of positive tests continues to rise at the same pace, that record will be broken next week.
Last week, the RIVM reported almost 54,000 new cases. The week before that it was almost 39,000.
Weekly Covid-19 hospitalizations have tripled in just over a month, according to figures from both the LCPS and NICE.They rose by 22 percent just this past week, according to patient coordination office LCPS.
Due to the increasing number of coronavirus cases, the test sites have also become much busier than before. The GGD health services tested almost 418,000 people last week, the highest number since mid-July, and that accounted for almost 72,000 infections. It means that more than 17 percent tested positive, the highest percentage since October last year.
More than 400,000 people were tested last week so they could enter a restaurant, cafe, cinema or theater. That is a new weekly record. Of these, 0.72 percent were diagnosed with the coronavirus infection, the highest percentage since July.
The basic reproduction (R) number, which indicates how quickly the coronavirus is spreading, remained fairly stable at 1.19 on Tuesday. That means that 100 people contagious with the viral infection spread the coronavirus to 119 others, who in turn gave it to 142. They then spread the virus to 169 more people.
That figure has hovered around 1.20 for the past few weeks. It was up slightly from 1.18 on Friday. It was 1.21 a week ago. That indicates that growth in infections will likely remain the same. The current figure of 1.19 is a measure of the situation from about two weeks ago. The RIVM model cannot guarantee an accurate projection of the current situation with newer data.
Covid hospitalizations tripled in a month; Most deaths since April
A total of 1,401 people were hospitalized with the disease, including 191 who were sent directly to an intensive care unit. By comparison, 1,152 people were admitted during the preceding seven-day period, including 128 sent to an ICU. That demonstrates that ICU admissions alone rose by nearly 50 percent.
The RIVM, using data from intensive care monitor NICE, reported a total of 1,137 hospital admissions for treatment of the coronavirus disease. That is already the highest number since May, and the figure could be subject to further revision which will add more confirmed Covid-19 cases to the tally. For example, last week's total was initially reported as 834 before it was revised up by 15 percent to 960.
As it stands, the preliminary figure from NICE for the week ending Tuesday, November 9, was already 18 percent higher than the final figure the week before. It also demonstrated a near 40 percent increase in ICU admissions, from 146 to 204.
When NICE recorded 960 hospitalizations, it rose from the previous week's total of 672. Before that, it released figures of 467 for the period from October 12-19, and 338 for the preceding week.
In the past week, the RIVM received 172 reports that a Covid-19 patient died as a result of the disease. That is the highest number since April, nearly seven months ago. The vast majority of people who died were already of advanced age. All of the deaths took place in the past two weeks.