LATEST: Croatia confirms 56 new COVID-19 cases, 6 deaths, 52 recoveries

Vili Beros (Photo: HINA/ Daniel KASAP)

ZAGREB, March 29 (Hina) – Fifty-six new COVID-19 cases have been confirmed in Croatia since 3 p.m. on Saturday, which puts their total number at 713, and a sixth patient has died, the national civil protection authority said on Sunday.

“The current situation, which is satisfactory, is a result of joint efforts by medical professionals, the civil protection authority and citizens. If we keep fighting against the epidemic this way, I believe that we will have as few harmful consequences as possible, which is why responsible behaviour is key to success,” Health Minister Vili Beros said at a news conference.

Direct flights with protective equipment for Croatia

Six patients suffering from COVID-19 have died. The sixth fatality is an 84-year-old patient from Zagreb’s KB Dubrava Hospital, who had previously suffered a stroke.

Twenty-six patients are on respirators, 5,900 samples have been tested, and 52 patients have recovered.

A plane from Shanghai carrying 13 tonnes of protective equipment landed in Zagreb today, and it is the first in a number of flights that will be bringing the necessary deliveries to Croatia in the coming weeks, Beros said, adding that the latest delivery, along with the one that arrived yesterday, also from China, with ten tonnes of protective equipment, significantly enhanced the country’s defence against the coronavirus.

The equipment will be distributed to medical institutions as well as other services – police, sanitary inspectors, etc.

A chimney on Zagreb’s maternity hospital that was damaged in last Sunday’s earthquake has been repaired so prematurely born babies, who had to be transferred from that hospital to the KB Dubrava Hospital, have been brought back to the maternity hospital, said the minister.

Number of tests increases manifold

The head of Zagreb’s Fran Mihaljevic Hospital for Infectious Diseases, Alemka Markotic, said that all patients on respirators had a more serious form of the disease and that the condition of most of them could become critical.

Those are mostly elderly persons, she said, warning the elderly and people suffering from chronic diseases to be very careful.

She said that the number of persons tested for the coronavirus had increased manifold compared to the situation of several weeks ago, and announced the possibility of introducing a new, quick test for the coronavirus that has been introduced in some European countries a few days ago.

She said that additional infrastructure was being mobilised to enable a larger number of tests.

Minister of the Interior Davor Bozinovic, who heads the national civil protection authority, said that so far there had been 3,402 reports about violations of self-isolation rules and that police had determined 893 cases of violation of self-isolation.

“Maybe the key to success in the fight against the coronavirus is in the hands of those who have been ordered to self-isolate. If they abide by those rules, we will all be able to deal with this crisis more easily and I urge them to obey the restrictions,” Bozinovic said, adding that the number of COVID-19 cases was not growing at an exponential rate for the time being and that everything possible was being done to prevent that from happening.