How Turkey Managed Coronavirus?
How Turkey Managed Coronavirus?
With the efficient treatment methods, highly developed health system, Turkey has been a true example for all the world especially Europe, fighting against Covid-19 and keeping the mortality rate really low during this pandemic period.
Turkey’s fight against Covid-19
Turkey has applied a different protocol since the outbreak of the virus. Firstly in January 2020 Committee of Science has been founded that would be mainly focused on how to fight against Covid-19. This committee consists of prominent science investigation specialists of the country. They researched and studied some of the old coronavirus outbreaks and took notes of how some of the countries fought successfully against coronavirus.
The first Covid-19 case has been seen in Turkey on 11th March 2020. But necessary precautions had been taken way before this date.
Thermal examination to the flights from China
All flights from China were suspended.
All the international passengers go through a thermal examination.
Thanks to the developments made in Turkey, tests that would took a long time to result were advanced into tests that give results in 90 minutes.
Border with Iran was closed due to the outbreak there.
All flights to/from Italy were suspended due to the severe outbreak.
First case seen in Turkey. WHO has declared Covid-19 as a pandemic.
After the first case seen on the 11th March, Science Committee of Turkey has applied a special treatment protocol according to the studies and statistics came from China.
The coronavirus started to spread all over the world very quickly and many countries experienced insufficient intensive care unit and respiratory equipment problems. Turkey has never experienced any problem regarding insufficient medical facilities and sources because the health infrastructure and technology is quite advanced and ready to serve millions of people.
According to some of the statistics of Statista, the numbers of intensive care beds that can be assigned for each 100thousand people are as follows:
| Country | Care Beds (Each 100 thousand people) |
|---|---|
| Turkey | 40 |
| USA | 34,7 |
| Germany | 29,2 |
| Italy | 12,5 |
| France | 11,6 |
| South Korea | 10,6 |
| Spain | 9,7 |
| Japan | 7,3,6 |
| UK | 6,6 |
| China | 3,6 |
Emergency services in Turkey prior to coronavirus had been extremely busy. Annually the total number of those admitted to the emergency in Turkey is 105 million while the total population is 80 millions. It is 23-25 million in the UK of 53 million and 130 million in the USA of 324 million. As the number of Covid-19 cases increased in Turkey, highly populated places such as commercial centers, cinemas, theaters, restaurants and cafes have been shut down and all the important instructions about how to deal with the virus have been published widely.
According to the recent researches, it has been understood that the Covid-19 is mostly dangerous for those above the age of 65 and those that have chronical diseases. As a result, on the 3rd of April an official confinement has been declared for people above the age of 65 for high risk of death and under the age of 20 as the contamination occurs fast amongst young people. The results of this confinement were quite promising as the number of deaths of people above the age of 65 decreased by half.
Turkey has followed a different protocol than other countries according to the studies of Committee of Health. A complex treatment regimen has been followed that ensured that the symptoms can not progress. The medications that were used have started to be produced by national medicine producers.
One of the most important studies in this process has been about filiation. In this project, all the people that got in contact with each coronavirus patient in the last 14 days have been found and located and got into quarentine. These people have been periodically controled and supervised through a mobile application. This method had a great impact on slowing the contamination process.
According to the World Health Organization’s statistics of the month of March, the mortality rate that occurs when the number of cases and deaths is considered worldwide is 3.4 percent. However, in some countries, the mortality rate of coronavirus is far above the mentioned average. Here are the most affected countries by Covid-19 in context of mortality rates:
| Country | Mortality Rate (Statistics of the month of March by WHO) |
|---|---|
| France | 17.3% |
| Belgium | 14.7% |
| UK | 13.5% |
| Italy | 13,2% |
| Spain | 10.5% |
| China | 5,5% |
| USA | 5,3% |
| Germany | 3,5% |
| Turkey | 2,3% |
There are 3 main factors of Turkey’s high success in the fight against Covid-19 during this process:
- Well-equipped facilities and highly developed health system
- Highly experienced doctors and health personnel
- Different methods of treatments applied to the patients
Having been trying to return to normal life by taking total control, Turkey has produced and donated to other countries nearly 200 respiratory apparatus, hundreds of thousands of face masks, medical supplies in order to support to combat Covid-19.
