The effect of lockdown and curfew on health care in the COVID-19 pandemic: Sakarya University study
The University of Sakarya (Turkey) has published an interesting scientific paper on the effect of curfew, or lockdown, on health care during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Many countries, including Italy and Turkey, took initial action to limit the spread of the coronavirus by suspending entry and exit from national borders, and therefore international flights.
They then established home isolation, restricted access to public activities and curfews.
In Italy, in fact, it is still forbidden to go out on the streets between 10 p.m. and 5 a.m., except in very specific and defined cases.
The effects of curfew on health care in COVID-19, the study published
The aim of this study was to identify the effect of curfew enforcement during the COVID-19 pandemic, in order to determine and identify whether curfew has a positive effect on health care workload.
The number of patients admitted to Sakarya University Training and Research Hospital, their means of arrival, hospital admissions, and demographic characteristics were retrospectively examined for the curfew period in April and May 2020 and the corresponding days in 2019.
Significant statistical differences between the two periods were analysed.
At the end of a careful analysis of the data, reading the pdf in full form is at the end of the article, the researchers concluded that curfew is one of the effective measures in several countries to mitigate the spread of COVID-19.
The complete lockdown applied on weekends and public holidays in Turkey significantly reduced unnecessary hospital admissions, the number of ambulances used, and produced a positive result in reducing trauma admissions, such as those from road traffic accidents and work-related injuries.
It also reduced the workload of health workers, who were already hard-pressed by the workload caused by the pandemic.
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Read the Sakarya University publication on COVID-19 curfew and health care
Universita turchia 483-Article Text-2320-3-10-20210101
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