Japan to name and shame hospitals that refuse Covid-19 patients, amid anger over baby’s death
- Move follows death of a baby born last week to an infected woman forced to give birth at home after being turned away from ‘several’ hospitals due to lack of beds
- With the Paralympics about to begin, average infection levels are 3.4 times as high as when the Olympics began around a month ago
The woman, who had Covid-19, could not deliver her baby at hospitals in Kashiwa city, Chiba prefecture, as no maternity beds were available in isolation wards. She gave birth at home alone 10 hours after first seeking medical care but her premature newborn died.
Local health officials confirmed that “several” hospitals refused to accept the woman, with the episode fuelling public criticism as many hospitals had accepted government subsidies at the outset of the pandemic last year to provide care for Covid-19 positive patients.
Health Minister Norihisa Tamura held talks with Tokyo Governor Yuriko Koike on Monday, after which a statement was released calling on all medical institutions and universities training medical staff “to cooperate” in the fight against the virus.
The request said hospitals and clinics across Tokyo needed to provide as many beds for inpatient treatment as possible and training institutions needed to dispatch personnel to places requiring assistance.
Pointedly, it added that the request was being made under the terms of the infectious disease prevention law, which was revised in February to give health authorities more power to force private hospitals to comply with their demands during a health-care crisis. The cities of Osaka and Sapporo have already cited the law in making similar requests, but this is the first time the national government has used it to pressure the medical sector.