Health Minister Nelu Tataru on Wednesday again urged the public to follow the COVID-19 health rules, emphasising that the COVID-19 pandemic is not sorted out in hospitals.
"Let's try at this point, let's call it a crossroad, to re-establish an approach to everything that means following certain rules. The system is the one that will give us the capacity. We, the healthcare professionals, are often asked what the limits would be. We have received 200 patients, we are receiving 1,000, we are receiving 2,000, we are receiving 3,000 patients a day, but let's see if that component of prevention is what can make the difference. Once again the COVID-19 pandemic is not sorted out in hospitals. This pandemic is being sorted out in pre-hospital settings,"Tataru said at the Government House.
He added that by following with rules, the number of SARS-CoV-2 infections will be reduced as community transmission decreases.
"There are really outbreaks in nursing homes, in children's centers, there are even outbreaks in healthcare facilities, there are really outbreaks say in businesses (...) but let's see where those outbreaks come from. There are events that are not completely supervised or certain rules are not followed; there is the public transport where we can see the rules are not followed either. Those are the infectious areas; let's take these things a little more seriously and we will see a decrease in the number of new cases."
According to Tataru, the restrictions re-imposed by the authorities in some counties and Bucharest City will show their effects in 10-14 days, provided that the public follow the rules.
"This number of cases - almost 3,000 cases - did not appear in September, it did not appear in August. There have been seven months in which we have been using certain rules in an attempt to manage an ongoing pandemic, to contain community transmission. The government, the healthcare system, the ministries are the ones that manage the pandemic from an administrative point of view, together with the local administrations. The civilian population is the one who prevents, having to follow rules and take some precautions. This is a moment that each of us have to manage in a particular way, this is the time when each of us has to be aware that the future health of this nation depends on us alone," said Tataru.
Romania's COVID-19 case count jumped by 2,958 in the last 24 hours as resulting from tests performed nationwide, the Strategic Communication Group (GCS), the official novel coronavirus communication task force, reported on Wednesday.