Putin instructs officials to involve army in fight against coronavirus
The situation with the coronavirus pandemic in Russia is not improving, said Russian President Vladimir Putin at a government meeting to discuss sanitary and epidemiological conditions on Monday.
"The number of people who are sick is increasing, and there more and more severe cases of the serious disease," Putin said, adding that "it is necessary to take into account all scenarios of the situation, even the most complex and extraordinary", in order to adjust the strategy and tactics of action in a flexible way, especially for medical care.
"The whole health care system should work as a single mechanism, we need to use all our resources effectively," the president said. "This includes quickly redirecting the protective gear for medical personnel, ventilators and medications, as well as medical teams to those regions and medical institutions where they are needed the most at the moment."
In Moscow, where ambulance staff, clinics, hospitals are working in a regime of extremely high tension and load, according to Putin, it is necessary to use the personnel potential of not only medical institutions, but also specialized universities and schools. "The Ministry of Defense soldiers work and work quite effectively abroad, helping our colleagues abroad to fight this infection. They have already accumulated considerable experience in rather difficult conditions," Putin said, adding that this experience "must certainly be used" and the capabilities of the Defense Ministry, if necessary, "can and should be utilized" inside Russia.
"The Ministry of Defense is working, I repeat, quite effectively. It is only using a small fraction of what it has, what it uses abroad. The main reserves are still available," Putin said.
He recalled that the Ministry of Defense has already started construction of new hospitals in the regions with the additional money allocated. A total of 16 such institutions are expected to be built.
“Failures in the fight against coronavirus by the regions will be considered "as criminal negligence" which will entail not only administrative responsibility,” Putin threatened. According to the medical staff, over the past 24 hours 2,558 more people have tested positive for coronavirus. The total number of cases has reached 18,328, and according to this indicator, Russia came in 15th place in the world, overtaking Portugal.
More than half of the new cases - 1,355 - were recorded in Moscow (against 1306 and 1030 in the previous two days). The Russian capital accounts for 63% of the total number of infected in Russia and 55% of reported deaths.
During the day, according to the operational headquarters, another 18 people died. 24 died on Sunday. The total death toll reached 148. The number of dead is still 10 times less than those discharged from hospitals - 179 in the past 24 hours and 1,470 since the beginning of the pandemic.
The upward trend in the number of cases remains stable - 16-18% per day, Deputy Prime Minister Tatiana Golikova told the President.
"Yesterday, there was 16.2% increase in Russia, in Moscow - 13.3%. In the Moscow region - 36.4%. In Russia, excluding Moscow and the Moscow region, it is 16.6%," she said.
The main increase in the number of cases - 72.3% - is in two regions - Moscow and the its suburbs. The incidence rate in Russia is 12.5 people per 100,000 cases. Moscow and the Moscow region are the leaders in the coronavirus cases. Then follows the Komi Republic - 24.6 people per 100,000, the Murmansk region and St. Petersburg. All other regions lag behind the Russian average," Golikova said.