The Canary Islands Health Service has reported an average of 180 new suspected cases of Covid-19 in the archipelago in the last week. These patients, who until now did not appear in the statistics, have begun to be counted after the new guideline set by the Ministry of Health, which has ordered the autonomous communities to carry out PCR tests on all people with symptoms compatible with the disease, regardless of whether they are severe or mild.
Until now, tests were only being carried out on patients with severe symptoms, as well as vulnerable groups or essential service workers. However, the Ministry published this Tuesday a new protocol approved last week, which requires tests to be carried out on any suspected case.
In this regard, the Ministry has established that a "any person with a clinical picture of acute respiratory infection of sudden onset of any severity, which presents, among others, with fever, cough or sensation of shortness of breath" will be considered a suspected case. Regarding other symptoms that have been associated with the coronavirus, such as loss of taste, loss of smell, diarrhea or muscle pain, it establishes that they will be assessed "as possible suspects under clinical criteria".
A non-cumulative index, because suspicion must be eliminated in 72 hours
The fact that the new protocol requires tests to be carried out within 24 hours on all suspected cases implies that this index is not cumulative, since within a maximum period of 72 hours (which is how long it may take to obtain and notify the results) they must be confirmed as positive or discarded.
Until 8 p.m. on Wednesday, the Ministry of Health maintained 280 suspected cases in the Canary Islands, pending the PCR tests that must be carried out with the new regulations that have just come into force.
Regarding the previous days, the Ministry points out that it "advanced" the notification of these cases since May 6, when the Ministry informed the communities of what the new protocol was going to be. Thus, during those last eight days, it affirms that the daily average of suspected cases has been 180.
According to sources in the health sector consulted by La Voz, the number of suspected cases with mild symptoms has been significantly reduced in recent weeks, at least in Lanzarote. Thus, the highest figures were recorded at the end of March and the beginning of April, when tests were not carried out on people with mild symptoms. In those cases, what had been done until now was to attend to these patients by telephone from primary care, asking them to remain isolated in their homes.
Since the beginning of the pandemic, PCR tests have been carried out on a total of 79,934 people in the Canary Islands in three and a half months, which means that they have reached 3.7% of the archipelago's population.