Antwerp alderman Els van Doesburg (N-VA): “Christmas red in… (Antwerp)
Antwerp’s alderman for health care, Els van Doesburg (N-VA), makes no bones about it. According to her, the question of Christmas may be red no longer relevant. “What we have to red now is each other,” she writes on Facebook. “Our hospitals just can’t take it anymore.”
Jan Stassins
Flemish Prime Minister Jan Jambon (N-VA) and Federal Minister of Health Frank Vandenbroucke (Vooruit) miss the mark completely in their attempt to make Christmas too red. That’s what Els van Doesburg (VA), Antwerp’s alderman for Healthcare, thinks.
Van Doesburg writes down her reservations in detail on Facebook. “Our nurses who are exhausted,” she writes. “Our doctors, who have their hands in their hair, want the hospitals to be full and only patients left. You’ve heard that before, haven’t you? I know. And you wonder how all that could possibly happen again? I know. But it doesn’t really matter that much today.”
“People will die”
As chairman of ZNA, the Hospital Network Antwerp, van Doesburg raises the alarm. “The raw reality is that hospitals are full and intensive care is suffering from a serious shortage of staff. They just don’t take it anymore. Care is postponed and I’ll tell you as it is: Survivors will die who otherwise had a chance of survival. People with Covid and people without Covid.”
The question of Christmas is still too red, according to the Antwerp ships, has become irrelevant. “What we have to do now is each other,” says van Doesburg. “That’s what it’s about. And we can. You know how the virus spreads. You know when you describe yourself in a risk situation. We all know that after almost two years of pandemic. All government measures are a foothold. Your common sense is the deciding factor. Don’t look at the restrictions the government puts on you, look at what you have to impose. The big deal is for later. It is now about you, the people around you and the medical care. Take care of each other.”