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Armenian Hospitals Again Under Strain As Omicron Spreads Fast


Armenia -- A medical worker takes notes at the Surp Grigor Lusarovich Medical Center in Yerevan, the country's largest hospital treating coronavirus patients, June 5, 2020.
Armenia -- A medical worker takes notes at the Surp Grigor Lusarovich Medical Center in Yerevan, the country's largest hospital treating coronavirus patients, June 5, 2020.

Health authorities pledged on Thursday to again boost capacity at Armenia’s hospitals to cope with the latest surge in coronavirus cases driven by the Omicron variant.

The Ministry of Health reported in the morning a new single-day record for cases. It said that about half of some 9,600 coronavirus tests administered in the country of about 3 million in the past 24 hours came back positive.

The ministry recorded only between 100 and 150 infections a day before detecting the first Omicron cases in early January. The highly contagious variant of the virus has been rapidly spreading for the last two weeks.

Citing expert analysis, Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian predicted that the daily number of cases will keep rising for at least one more week.

“We use certain algorithms and hope that the numbers will not exceed the forecast maximum,” he said during a cabinet meeting. “And we are now taking measures in order to properly confront that wave.”

“In line with a contingency plan, our [healthcare] system is resorting to yet another deployment of more hospital beds,” Health Minister Anahit Avanesian said for her part. “The system is now working in a tense regime to properly organize both preventive measures and medical aid to our population.”

Officials put the number of hospitalized COVID-19 patients at 1,543. More than 83 percent of them are not vaccinated.

Roughly one-third of the country’s population has received two doses of a coronavirus vaccine to date. And only about 9,000 “booster” shots were administered as of January 30, according to the Ministry of Health.

“The vaccination rate is certainly very low, and we must take measures to increase it,” said Pashinian.

The government introduced on January 22 a mandatory health pass for entry to cultural and leisure venues. Only those people who have been vaccinated against COVID-19 or have had a recent negative test are allowed to visit them.

Some restaurant owners have criticized the measure, saying that the average number of their customers has fallen as a result.

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