Hospital At Home Units In The Post‐Covid 19 ERA

Coloma, Emmanuel; Nicolás, David

Since the start of the SARS‐CoV‐2 outbreak in China in December 2019 COVID‐19 has affected nearly 4,5 million people around the world, with almost 286,000 fatalities reported as of the current date(1). The World Health Organization declared COVID‐19 as a Public Health Emergency of International Concern on January 30(th), 2020 and on March 11(th) COVID‐19 was declared a pandemic disease(2). In Spain, first cases were diagnosed in early February, with the incidence peak occurring between the last week of March and the first week of April. At the time of writing this article 227,000 patients were infected and 26,000 patients had died of COVID‐19(1). The rapid spread of the virus and the severity of the disease has been a real challenge to the health systems of most affected countries, compelling to the transformation of hospitals in COVID‐19 monographic centres. In order to cover COVID‐19 overwhelming necessities, non‐COVID activity was reduced to the minimum, cancelling non‐urgent surgery, outpatient clinics and treatments, and diagnostic tests.