Why Europe’s hospitals – among the best in the world – are struggling with coronavirus
- Covid-19 has exposed surprising paradox: some of the top health care systems are remarkably ill-equipped to deal with a pandemic
- Experts say problems include early complacency and lack of epidemic experience, as Europe has not had major outbreak for over 100 years
As increasing numbers of European hospitals buckle under the strain of tens of thousands of coronavirus patients, the crisis has exposed a surprising paradox: some of the world’s best health systems are remarkably ill-equipped to handle a pandemic.
Outbreak experts say Europe’s hospital-centric systems, lack of epidemic experience and early complacency are partly to blame for the pandemic’s catastrophic tear across the continent.
“If you have cancer, you want to be in a European hospital,” said Brice de le Vingne, who heads Covid-19 operations for Medecins Sans Frontieres in Belgium. “But Europe hasn’t had a major outbreak in more than 100 years, and now they don’t know what to do.”
Last week, the World Health Organisation scolded countries for “squandering” their chance to stop the virus from gaining a foothold, saying that countries should have reacted more aggressively two months ago, including implementing wider testing and stronger surveillance measures.
De le Vingne and others say Europe’s approach to combating the new coronavirus was initially too lax and severely lacking in epidemiological basics like contact tracing, an arduous process where health officials physically track down people who have come into contact with those infected to monitor how and where the virus is spreading.