{"id":25513,"date":"2020-03-24T16:30:46","date_gmt":"2020-03-24T14:30:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.cins.rs\/?p=25513"},"modified":"2020-07-25T16:09:30","modified_gmt":"2020-07-25T14:09:30","slug":"coronavirus-health-care-institutions-tight-lipped-about-ventilators-nearly-all-ventilators-at-dedinje-hospital-in-use","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.cins.rs\/en\/coronavirus-health-care-institutions-tight-lipped-about-ventilators-nearly-all-ventilators-at-dedinje-hospital-in-use\/","title":{"rendered":"Coronavirus: Health Care Institutions Tight-Lipped About Ventilators, Nearly All Ventilators at Dedinje Hospital in Use"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Center for Investigative Journalism of Serbi<\/em>a (CINS) recently published official data<\/a> on the number of medical ventilators received from the Institute of Public Health of Serbia Dr. Milan Jovanovi\u0107 Batut<\/em>. There is little official data available on the subject that is publicly talked about a lot during coronavirus spread, and even when data are presented, in most cases the one who unveils them is Serbian President Aleksandar Vu\u010di\u0107<\/strong>.<\/p>

That is why CINS journalists attempted to go further and find out from the 103 health care institutions on Batut\u2019s list what the situation regarding ventilators is like today \u2013 how many are being used, how many are available and whether they have gotten some new ones in the meantime.<\/p>

Out of the total number of hospitals, health centers, institutes and clinics we called in the last two days, we managed to get in contact with 89, with representatives of most of them refusing to talk about ventilators. Just over a third, 37 to be specific, told us to address the Ministry of Health<\/em>, Provincial Secretariat for Health Care<\/em> or the Batut Institute for this information.<\/p>

Out of the 31 health care institutions that did give us some information on ventilators, in 11 cases the data differed from those contained in Batut\u2019s report \u2013 the institutions\u2019 representatives either claim that there are more or fewer ventilators than what was stated in the report.<\/p>

The director of the Vrbas Health Center, Jasmina Assi<\/strong>, told us they had four ventilators, whereas Batut\u2019s report says they have three. When asked how many were available, she replied that patients did not stay at the Health Center.<\/p>

\u201cWe are a hospital institution that transports patients with respiratory instability to an institution of a higher level, i.e. secondary and in this case tertiary as well,\u201d said Assi.<\/p>

Jovo Komazec<\/strong>, director of the Health Center in In\u0111ija, says that even though the Batut report states that they have one ventilator, they actually do not have any.<\/p>

\u201cThe fact that they wrote \u2018one\u2019, those who took inventory, they wrote down ventilator instead of inhaler,\u201d explains Komazec.<\/p>

\u201cNinety percent of ventilators are in use every day, complex patients are treated who are urgent and who require immediate treatment\u201d \u2013 Institute for Cardiovascular Diseases Dedinje.<\/p><\/blockquote>

As for the Prokuplje General Hospital, the Batut report says the hospital has three ventilators in total and that all three are operational. However, representatives of this hospital told us that they actually had four ventilators, but that one was being repaired.<\/p>

The other 20 institutions confirmed the data they had given Batut. One of them is Katarina Lazi\u0107<\/strong>, a doctor at the Institute of Neonatology<\/em>:<\/p>

\u201cThe Institute of Neonatology<\/em> has 21 ventilators, two of which are transport ventilators. All the ventilators are neonatal, i.e. envisaged for applying mechanical ventilatory support in newborns. The number of occupied, i.e. available ventilators is variable and a report is delivered to the competent services on a daily basis,\u201d says Lazi\u0107.<\/p>

At a press conference a few days ago, Serbian President Aleksandar Vu\u010di\u0107 said that out of the existing ventilators, 1,008 according to his information, just 400 were available, i.e. they were not being used by other, non-coronavirus patients. He also announced that the number would be increased by the procurement of 352 new ventilators.<\/p>

The fact that many ventilators are currently being used can also be guessed based on the data CINS obtained by contacting hospitals and health centers nationwide.<\/p>

Milovan Boji\u0107<\/strong>, health minister during the rule of Slobodan Milo\u0161evi\u0107<\/strong> and current director of the Institute for Cardiovascular Diseases Dedinje<\/em>, says that out of the 30 ventilators at the Institute, just two days ago more than 20 had been in use. Anesthesiologist and assistant director Dragana Uni\u0107 Stojanovi\u0107<\/strong> confirmed this:<\/p>

\u201cNinety percent of ventilators are in use every day, complex patients are treated who are urgent and who require immediate treatment.\u201d<\/p>

Director Boji\u0107 added that two of the total number of ventilators were on their last legs.<\/p>

Silence of Institutions<\/h2>

As many as 58 institutions refused to answer or, most frequently, told us to address the Ministry of Health<\/em> or\u00a0 the Provincial Secretariat for Health Care<\/em>.<\/p>

At the General Hospital in Subotica, where a public procurement procedure for the urgent repair of ventilators was launched on March 18, representatives declined to provide any information, but rather told us that all information for the media went through the Ministry of Health<\/em> or the Provincial Secretariat<\/em>.<\/p>

Branko Luki\u0107<\/strong>, director of the General Hospital in Petrovac na Mlavi, first told CINS that they were banned from disclosing such information, and then corrected himself and said that it was not a ban but the official stance of the entire health care sector.<\/p>

\u201cEverything you want to know about coronavirus, this infection, the disease and that technical equipment, the Ministry provides information on all that,\u201d Luki\u0107 explained.<\/p>

We got a similar reply from the General Hospital in Smederevo, while representatives of the Negotin hospital told us to address, besides the Ministry, the Institute of Public Health Timok<\/em>.<\/p>

\u201cDuring a state of emergency, the directors of institutions do not disclose such information,\u201d Negotin General Hospital representatives told CINS.<\/p>

Director of the Health Center in Sremska Mitrovica Miroslava \u0160evo<\/strong> pointed out that she only gave statements to the Provincial Secretariat.<\/em><\/p>

\u201cYou can contact them, we do not give any statements,\u201d added \u0160evo.<\/p>

Nevertheless, neither the Ministry nor the Provincial Secretariat answered the questions we sent them.<\/p>

There were some who did not direct us toward other state institutions, but still refused to give any information. The person who answered the phone at the Health Center in \u010cajetina told us that \u201cit is well known who gives such information to journalists.\u201d When we asked whom we should contact, they hung up.<\/p>

Some health care institutions requested that we send them our questions in an e-mail, some asked that we do so by mail, while others promised that someone would get back to us, but that did not happen.<\/p>

Clinical Centers Ignoring Journalists<\/h2>

In the past two days, CINS failed to establish communication with 13 health care institutions, including the Clinical Center in Ni\u0161. Besides Belgrade and Kikinda, according to the information from a few days ago, Ni\u0161 was one of the cities most affected by the coronavirus. Nonetheless, representatives of the institution are not communicating with the media. As website Ju\u017ene Vesti<\/a> reported a few days ago, Ni\u0161 journalists have sent an appealto Serbian President Aleksandar Vu\u010di\u0107<\/strong> and Prime Minister Ana Brnabi\u0107<\/strong>, requesting that information not be hidden and that the competent services be forced to do their job and inform the citizens.<\/p><\/div>

The clinical centers in Belgrade, Kragujevac and Novi Sad are not much more open either. Representatives of the clinical centers in Novi Sad and Kragujevac told CINS journalists to contact the Provincial Secretariat, i.e. the Ministry of Health, whereas in Belgrade they asked that we send the questions in an e-mail, and then did not answer them. <\/p><\/div>

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