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In One Nation, Infected Doctors Are Asked to Keep Working

 

A sign of how bad things are in Belgium in regard to COVID-19: Doctors and nurses who've tested positive but have no symptoms are being asked to continue working in some overwhelmed hospitals, reports the Washington Post. 

"The situation is catastrophic," says an ICU doctor in the hard-hit city of Liege. 

Hospitalizations are up 87% in the nation over the past week as the nation heads toward what the health minister refers to as a "tsunami" of cases. 

"A major issue is the risk of the collapse of the hospital system of our country," says the minister-president of Brussels. 

Belgium's infection rate is five times higher than that of the US and second only to the Czech Republic's in the European Union. 

The rolling average of daily Czech cases is now 115 per 100,000 people, up from 48 per 100,000 just two weeks ago, per the AP. 

The government is asking Parliament to extend a state of emergency for another month, to Dec. 3. 

QUESTIONS:
1) Describe how "catastrophic" the working conditions of the nurses and doctors are in Belgium. 

2) How much overwhelmed are the hospitals in the said country? 

3) Compare Belgium's COVID-19 situation to the US' and Czech Republic's. 

4) If ever, what can be the worst case scenario if the hospital system collapses? Provide some details. 

5) How will you illustrate your country's current hospital system and state? 

VOCABULARY/EXPRESSION:
rolling average - a calculation to analyze data points by creating a series of averages of different subsets of the full data set