Moscow Sees Explosive Growth of COVID-19 Infections, Mayor says

The number of detected coronavirus infections in Moscow over the past few days has grown by 80%, and the number of hospitalized patients with a severe case of the disease has increased by 70%, Moscow Mayor Sergey Sobyanin told journalists on Tuesday.

"Over recent days, we have been observing the explosive growth of COVID diagnoses - about 80%, and the admission of patients in a serious condition to Moscow inpatient facilities has increased by 70%. <….> [Moscow residents] began to relax, they think that everything is already over. COVID has a treacherous history, we see how the rise is underway in Europe: about a month and a half ago there was a very serious outbreak, and now we are having an increase, and a very significant one at that. It is higher, than, say, last April-May when we first encountered this, and it has practically reached the December peak at the end of last year. I am confident we will win," the mayor said during a visit to the Filatov city clinical hospital No. 15.

Valery Vechorko, the hospital's chief physician, added that the hospital admitted more than 22,000 patients over four months of operations in a regular mode, and would have liked to continue working in this format, yet is again forced to repurpose. "In my opinion, vaccination should be the main message [to the Moscow residents]. I am saying this as a doctor. The more we inoculate, the faster we will cope with this (the coronavirus epidemic - TASS)," he said.

The Moscow mayor stressed that during non-working days, Moscow's residents should restrict contacts as much as possible in order to break the chain and growth of the infections. "It is even more important to visit vaccination stations during these days. They are all open, all accessible, so we're inviting the...