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COVID-19

Are coronavirus cases increasing in Denmark?

109 new cases of coronavirus were registered in Denmark during the weekend, and a further 30 were confirmed on Tuesday.

Published: 28 July 2020 15:26 CEST
Are coronavirus cases increasing in Denmark?
People in central Copenhagen earlier this month. Photo: Ida Marie Odgaard/Ritzau Scanpix

The official figures come from national infectious disease agency Statens Serum Institut (SSI).

Data from the weekend’s 109 figures correlates to an average of 36 new cases per day between Friday and Monday.

A total of 22 people are currently hospitalised with Covid-19 in Denmark, according to the latest figures published on Tuesday; three of these are in intensive care and receiving ventilator treatment.

A total of 15,214 new tests have been conducted since the previous count, according to SSI’s daily update. This does not necessarily correspond to the time frame covered by the figure for new confirmed cases.

Meanwhile, a large number of municipalities across the country show infection rates of 0 per 100,000 residents for the 7-day period up to July 28th.

Many others have infection rates of between 1 and 19 per 100,000 inhabitants while two municipalities – Herlev and Køge – are displayed as having between 20 and 29 infections per 100,000 inhabitants.

The criteria currently used by health authorities in Denmark for considering European travel to be safe is an infection rate of under 20 per 100,000 inhabitants in the destination country.

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Screengrab: SSI

The average number of daily new Covid-19 case over the two weeks previous to last week is 24 per day (week commencing July 6th) and 34 per day (week commencing July 13th).

Testing has remained stable in July at around 15,000 per day on weekdays and 10,000 per day on weekends, according to SSI’s archive of daily updates.

 

As such, the average number of cases recorded each day appears to be relatively stable and at a low level over the last three weeks, with local breakdowns also showing low figures.

Last week, Minister of Health Magnus Heunicke advised the public to maintain hygiene but also said the virus remained “under control” in the country.

“The Danish Patient Safety Authority is responsible for tracing active infections and they report that there are no persistent, out-of-control infection chains. Further, the total number of newly-hospitalised is still stable at a low level,” he added at the time.

Last weekend saw an increase in the number of hospitalised patients from 16 to 23 (this has since fallen again, to 22).

It should be noted that this may be related to fewer patients being discharged from hospitals in general on weekends.

The latest update from SSI is reassuring, according to Christian Wejse, a specialist in infectious diseases at Aarhus University.

SSI’s archived data shows daily new infection figures of 32, 37, 35, 54 and 38 from Monday to Friday last week.

“The figures look reasonable today after we have seen an increase in the number of infections in recent weeks, but now it looks more reassuring,” Wejse told Ritzau.

“If we had seen a continued increase in the number of infections, that would have been a cause for concern,” he added.

13,577 people have tested positive for the coronavirus since the beginning of the epidemic in Denmark. 613 deaths with the virus have been recorded.

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COVID-19

Public Health Agency recommends two Covid doses next year for elderly

Sweden's Public Health Agency is recommending that those above the age of 80 should receive two doses of a Covid-19 vaccine a year, once in the spring and once in the autumn, as it shifts towards a longer-term strategy for the virus.

Published: 23 December 2022 10:53 CET
Public Health Agency recommends two Covid doses next year for elderly

In a new recommendation, the agency said that those living in elderly care centres, and those above the age of 80 should from March 1st receive two vaccinations a year, with a six month gap between doses. 

“Elderly people develop a somewhat worse immune defence after vaccination and immunity wanes faster than among young and healthy people,” the agency said. “That means that elderly people have a greater need of booster doses than younger ones. The Swedish Public Health Agency considers, based on the current knowledge, that it will be important even going into the future to have booster doses for the elderly and people in risk groups.” 

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People between the ages of 65 and 79 years old and young people with risk factors, such as obesity, diabetes, poor kidney function or high blood pressure, are recommended to take one additional dose per year.

The new vaccination recommendation, which will start to apply from March 1st next year, is only for 2023, Johanna Rubin, the investigator in the agency’s vaccination programme unit, explained. 

She said too much was still unclear about how long protection from vaccination lasted to institute a permanent programme.

“This recommendation applies to 2023. There is not really an abundance of data on how long protection lasts after a booster dose, of course, but this is what we can say for now,” she told the TT newswire. 

It was likely, however, that elderly people would end up being given an annual dose to protect them from any new variants, as has long been the case with influenza.

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