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Tribune News Network
Doha
Qatar will rope in well-trained doctors and nurses from Cuba to assist its frontline fight against the spread of coronavirus, a top Ministry of Public Health (MoPH) official has said.
“We have a positive experience with Cuba through the Cuban Hospital and our experience with the Cuban hospital and Cuban doctors is excellent,” Dr Abdullatif al Khal, Co-Chair of the National Pandemic Preparedness Committee, told Abdulaziz al Nasser, a Qatari anchor at beIN Sports, in an exhaustive interview.
“Cuba is a friendly country and extends a helping hand to Qatar. It is one of the countries that exports doctors and nurses,” Dr Khal said in the interview published on Nasser’s Instagram account.
In the conversation, Dr Khal explained some of the critical aspects of Qatar’s fight against the virus transmission.
On vaccine development, he said it would take at least a year or so to get a vaccine ready.
“At the very least, we need between a year and a year and a half to get a vaccine. Until then, the best thing we can do is to try and control the virus by following the health instructions and social distancing,” Dr Khal said.
He said all the preventive measures and precautions have helped massively limit the spread of the virus and reduce the number of deaths.
With regard to treatments, he said drugs that were used to treat other diseases have proven to be effective in controlling symptoms of coronavirus infection and those drugs are readily available in Qatar.
“Drugs such as hydroxycloquine and Tamiflu, which is a viral antibiotic, have shown encouraging results. There is an antibiotic called Zithromax, which works to reduce the immune reaction against the virus,” he added.
Dr Khal said Qatar has started collecting plasma from patients who have recovered from the virus to be used as a mode of treatment against COVID-19.
“We decided to start collecting plasma from donors and give it to people suffering from severe infections,” he said.
“The idea is to give the plasma collected from COVID-19 survivors saturated to people with severe infections or in intensive care. We hope that this will contribute to strengthening the immunity of the infected person so that he can overcome the virus,” he said, adding that this method has been tried in several countries.
A study conducted in China on 10 patients had shown positive results and people recovered from the disease, he added.
With regard to new cases, he said the past few days have seen new cases range between 150 and 250 cases per day. “The measures that are currently being applied will contribute to limiting this increase,” he said.
“We are trying to flatten the curve for infections, so that the burden on the health sector is lower and the number of deaths is less.”
He said the infections are severe in the case of elderly people. “We are not talking about the oldest people, but about those who are more than 50 years old. As the age increases, the risk percentage increases.”
He said if a young person is infected with the virus, it is usually a slight infection and he or she may be hospitalised for two or three weeks.
Dr Khal said there are cases of medical workers contracting the virus.
He said, “Like the rest of the world, the virus began to infect medical workers. This is a problem because we need what is most important for doctors, nurses, and supporting medical specialties.”
He said there are measures to increase precautions to reduce the spread of the epidemic, but doctors and nurses are ultimately members of the community and may be at risk of contracting a virus in a hospital or other location.
“They must take the utmost care during practicing their medical work and applying preventive measures and social distancing outside their working hours,” he added.
Dr Khal said there are two mechanisms to deal with the pandemic -- the first part is reducing the spread of the virus in the community and the second is increasing the hospital capacity to the maximum extent possible so that there are maximum numbers of intensive care rooms.
He cited the example of Singapore in limiting the spread of the virus.
He said, “One of the successful examples in this field is Singapore. Despite its proximity to China, Singapore has been able to reduce the spread of the virus significantly, and this is because of the success of public health measures.”
In Germany, the number of deaths is still relatively small due to the large capacity of hospitals and their ability to deal with large numbers of cases.
“We, in Qatar, have taken our precautions and taken these scenarios into consideration,” he added.
On the lack of commitment of some people in quarantine, he said, “Home quarantine means the obligation to remain completely isolated from others for a period of two weeks, and there are people who did not commit to quarantine, which caused the spread of the virus among their family members or others in the community.”
“There were people who did not adhere to the procedures of quarantine in hotels and mixed with each other. This contributed to the spread of the virus among them,” he added.
“What we are now asking of all those in quarantine to follow the instructions as a national duty or a religious obligation. For those who do not have a strong national affiliation or a strong religious affiliation, they must abide by the instructions from a purely humanitarian point of view,” he said.
Dr Khal pointed out that tests are a key factor in dealing with a pandemic.
“The more a country's ability to conduct the largest number of tests, the higher its capacity to respond to the virus,” he noted.
He said the ability of Qatar to conduct tests increased rapidly during the past weeks, thanks to the great support the state provided, as well as the efforts of the Ministry of Public Health and Hamad Medical Corporation to increase the absorptive capacity for tests.
“There are continuous efforts to increase the daily ability to conduct examinations, and these examinations are very costly. These tests should be carried out in major laboratories, and there is still no technology that helps to conduct investigations in small places and clinics quickly, but this technology is on the way,” he added.
Dr Khal said there are companies that have developed tests that can be done at health centres, airports or places to investigate infection without the need to take samples in large laboratories.
“These test results from these devices are accurate. The Ministry of Public Health is now working to provide such devices,” he said.
Regarding life returning to normal, he said, “I believe lowering down these precautions whether in malls or mosques or public places can have a big negative affect. Medically speaking, we need more time. There isn’t any scientific evidence to prove that the virus can be the terminated in hot temperatures,” he said.
“The measures we are taking now will continue for a longer period than we had hoped for. From the medical and epidemiological side, there are no indications that the epidemic will be controlled by Eid al Fitr. This time is very short and there is no country in the world that can say that it can restore conditions to what was previously so fast.”
“What we have learned so far is that the virus continues to spread, whether in the southern part of the globe where the weather is hot or in the northern part where the weather is cold. So far, it has not been proven that summer limited the spread of the virus and there is no scientific thing on which we can reach this conclusion,” he noted.
On Qataris being admitted to intensive care, he said, “Yes, there are dozens of Qataris in the intensive care. The numbers are increasing and effective control can only be completely done by applying social distancing.”
Regarding tracing all the people who dealt with workers at the central market who were diagnosed with the virus, he said a responsible committee tracked down all the cases according to a certain system followed by an investigation with all the infected workers and by following all the lines they have successfully tracked down all those who had met or dealt with the infected workers.
Doha
Qatar will rope in well-trained doctors and nurses from Cuba to assist its frontline fight against the spread of coronavirus, a top Ministry of Public Health (MoPH) official has said.
“We have a positive experience with Cuba through the Cuban Hospital and our experience with the Cuban hospital and Cuban doctors is excellent,” Dr Abdullatif al Khal, Co-Chair of the National Pandemic Preparedness Committee, told Abdulaziz al Nasser, a Qatari anchor at beIN Sports, in an exhaustive interview.
“Cuba is a friendly country and extends a helping hand to Qatar. It is one of the countries that exports doctors and nurses,” Dr Khal said in the interview published on Nasser’s Instagram account.
In the conversation, Dr Khal explained some of the critical aspects of Qatar’s fight against the virus transmission.
On vaccine development, he said it would take at least a year or so to get a vaccine ready.
“At the very least, we need between a year and a year and a half to get a vaccine. Until then, the best thing we can do is to try and control the virus by following the health instructions and social distancing,” Dr Khal said.
He said all the preventive measures and precautions have helped massively limit the spread of the virus and reduce the number of deaths.
With regard to treatments, he said drugs that were used to treat other diseases have proven to be effective in controlling symptoms of coronavirus infection and those drugs are readily available in Qatar.
“Drugs such as hydroxycloquine and Tamiflu, which is a viral antibiotic, have shown encouraging results. There is an antibiotic called Zithromax, which works to reduce the immune reaction against the virus,” he added.
Dr Khal said Qatar has started collecting plasma from patients who have recovered from the virus to be used as a mode of treatment against COVID-19.
“We decided to start collecting plasma from donors and give it to people suffering from severe infections,” he said.
“The idea is to give the plasma collected from COVID-19 survivors saturated to people with severe infections or in intensive care. We hope that this will contribute to strengthening the immunity of the infected person so that he can overcome the virus,” he said, adding that this method has been tried in several countries.
A study conducted in China on 10 patients had shown positive results and people recovered from the disease, he added.
With regard to new cases, he said the past few days have seen new cases range between 150 and 250 cases per day. “The measures that are currently being applied will contribute to limiting this increase,” he said.
“We are trying to flatten the curve for infections, so that the burden on the health sector is lower and the number of deaths is less.”
He said the infections are severe in the case of elderly people. “We are not talking about the oldest people, but about those who are more than 50 years old. As the age increases, the risk percentage increases.”
He said if a young person is infected with the virus, it is usually a slight infection and he or she may be hospitalised for two or three weeks.
Dr Khal said there are cases of medical workers contracting the virus.
He said, “Like the rest of the world, the virus began to infect medical workers. This is a problem because we need what is most important for doctors, nurses, and supporting medical specialties.”
He said there are measures to increase precautions to reduce the spread of the epidemic, but doctors and nurses are ultimately members of the community and may be at risk of contracting a virus in a hospital or other location.
“They must take the utmost care during practicing their medical work and applying preventive measures and social distancing outside their working hours,” he added.
Dr Khal said there are two mechanisms to deal with the pandemic -- the first part is reducing the spread of the virus in the community and the second is increasing the hospital capacity to the maximum extent possible so that there are maximum numbers of intensive care rooms.
He cited the example of Singapore in limiting the spread of the virus.
He said, “One of the successful examples in this field is Singapore. Despite its proximity to China, Singapore has been able to reduce the spread of the virus significantly, and this is because of the success of public health measures.”
In Germany, the number of deaths is still relatively small due to the large capacity of hospitals and their ability to deal with large numbers of cases.
“We, in Qatar, have taken our precautions and taken these scenarios into consideration,” he added.
On the lack of commitment of some people in quarantine, he said, “Home quarantine means the obligation to remain completely isolated from others for a period of two weeks, and there are people who did not commit to quarantine, which caused the spread of the virus among their family members or others in the community.”
“There were people who did not adhere to the procedures of quarantine in hotels and mixed with each other. This contributed to the spread of the virus among them,” he added.
“What we are now asking of all those in quarantine to follow the instructions as a national duty or a religious obligation. For those who do not have a strong national affiliation or a strong religious affiliation, they must abide by the instructions from a purely humanitarian point of view,” he said.
Dr Khal pointed out that tests are a key factor in dealing with a pandemic.
“The more a country's ability to conduct the largest number of tests, the higher its capacity to respond to the virus,” he noted.
He said the ability of Qatar to conduct tests increased rapidly during the past weeks, thanks to the great support the state provided, as well as the efforts of the Ministry of Public Health and Hamad Medical Corporation to increase the absorptive capacity for tests.
“There are continuous efforts to increase the daily ability to conduct examinations, and these examinations are very costly. These tests should be carried out in major laboratories, and there is still no technology that helps to conduct investigations in small places and clinics quickly, but this technology is on the way,” he added.
Dr Khal said there are companies that have developed tests that can be done at health centres, airports or places to investigate infection without the need to take samples in large laboratories.
“These test results from these devices are accurate. The Ministry of Public Health is now working to provide such devices,” he said.
Regarding life returning to normal, he said, “I believe lowering down these precautions whether in malls or mosques or public places can have a big negative affect. Medically speaking, we need more time. There isn’t any scientific evidence to prove that the virus can be the terminated in hot temperatures,” he said.
“The measures we are taking now will continue for a longer period than we had hoped for. From the medical and epidemiological side, there are no indications that the epidemic will be controlled by Eid al Fitr. This time is very short and there is no country in the world that can say that it can restore conditions to what was previously so fast.”
“What we have learned so far is that the virus continues to spread, whether in the southern part of the globe where the weather is hot or in the northern part where the weather is cold. So far, it has not been proven that summer limited the spread of the virus and there is no scientific thing on which we can reach this conclusion,” he noted.
On Qataris being admitted to intensive care, he said, “Yes, there are dozens of Qataris in the intensive care. The numbers are increasing and effective control can only be completely done by applying social distancing.”
Regarding tracing all the people who dealt with workers at the central market who were diagnosed with the virus, he said a responsible committee tracked down all the cases according to a certain system followed by an investigation with all the infected workers and by following all the lines they have successfully tracked down all those who had met or dealt with the infected workers.
