Taiwan will adjust its regulations pertaining to the discharge of hospitalized COVID-19 patients, starting Wednesday, in an effort to free up medical capacity, the Central Epidemic Command Center (CECC) said Tuesday.
Under the current regulations, patients admitted to COVID-19 hospital isolation wards are discharged only if their symptoms have eased, they have not had a fever for at least one day, and their PCR test is either negative or has a CT value of 30 or higher.
Starting Wednesday, however, patients who have been hospitalized with severe COVID-19 infections will be eligible for discharge, with their doctors’ permission, if their PCR test shows a CT value of 27-30 and it has been at least 15 days since they first tested positive for COVID-19 or developed symptoms of the disease.
The CECC defines severe infections as those that require hospitalization in an intensive care unit.
Patients who have been hospitalized with “moderate” infections, meanwhile, will be eligible for discharge after seven days, without a PCR test, as long as their symptoms have abated or disappeared, the CECC said.
At a press briefing Tuesday, CECC official Lo Yi-chun (???) said doctors have been reporting large numbers of cases in which recovered patients are remaining in hospital for two to three weeks, even after they are no longer contagious.
Citing recent international scientific studies, Lo said that 15 days after a COVID-19 infection, the probability of detecting the virus in a lab culture is only 5 percent.
After 21 days, the probability drops to zero percent, which suggests that in such cases, there is almost no chance that the patient is still contagious, he said.
The revised hospital discharge policy comes as Taiwan is facing a reduced availability of beds in COVID-19 hospital isolation wards, particularly in central and southern parts of the country, where cases have been on the rise.
As of Tuesday, 42.3 percent of the total 13,855 beds on COVID-19 hospital wards throughout the country were vacant, according to CECC statistics.
Regionally, the bed vacancy in southern Taiwan was only 30.4 percent, compared to 45.8 percent in central areas, 50.8 percent in the south, and 51.3 percent in the north, the data showed.
In Taipei and the Kaohsiung to Pingtung areas, which are calculated separately, the vacancy rates were 32.4 percent and 58.4 percent, respectively, the data showed.
Source: Focus Taiwan News Channel