The reported number of deaths from coronavirus in Finland is likely to see a jump this coming week, as fatalities in elderly homes will be added to statistics for the first time.
Until now, Finland was only counting Covid-19 deaths in hospitals and not in other places like elderly care homes, and the Finnish Institute for Health and Welfare THL concedes there will probably be dozens of patient deaths to add to the total.
By Sunday evening THL reported 3,783 confirmed coronavirus cases - an increase of 102 from the previous day - out of 57,300 tests carried out.
There are also 94 deaths reported, but “the total does not currently cover all out-of-hospital deaths” THL says. Healthcare officials will start including other coronavirus deaths that happen outside of hospitals in their statistics from Monday. HUS Chief Physician Markku Mäkijärvi tells the Finnish News Agency STT that there could be 50 or 60 deaths in his region alone which have not been included in official figures.
Across the country on Sunday there are 192 people in hospital, and 68 of those in intensive care. However the number of people in hospital has dropped by almost three dozen in the last week.
And in the capital city region during last week, coronavirus tests were done on 113 children at Jorvi Hospital and the new Helsinki Children’s Hospital but only three cases were found.
Mikael Kuitinen from HUS says that these numbers are in line with expectations with other international studies. So far there have been no pediatric patients admitted to hospital or intensive care in the Helsinki and Uusimaa Hospital District.
