11.04.2022

Cur­rent Coro­n­avirus Infor­ma­tion in Soite’s Area on April 11th 2022

The cur­rent sit­u­a­tion of infection 

The inci­dence of coro­n­avirus is slow­ly decreas­ing in Soite’s area, but the need for hos­pi­tal care is still on a high lev­el. Dur­ing last week (week 14), a total of 863 new coro­n­avirus infec­tions were con­firmed in Soite’s tests. Last week, 1,550 coro­n­avirus tests were tak­en. The share of pos­i­tive tests was 56 %. This does not include infec­tions con­firmed through home tests, so the actu­al num­ber is even higher. 

Fif­teen COVID-19 pos­i­tive patients are cur­rent­ly being treat­ed at Cen­tral Ostro­both­nia cen­tral hos­pi­tal. There are cur­rent­ly no coro­n­avirus patients in inten­sive care. 

The key fig­ures in the sit­u­a­tion­al pic­ture have been updat­ed: 

• Infections during last week: 863 (a week ago 805) 
• In hospital care: 15 coronavirus patients 
• Number of infections in the last 14 days 1,668 (a week ago 1,934) 
• The incidence of infections during the last 14 days/100 000 citizens:  2,155 (a week ago 2,499) 
• Since the beginning of the pandemic, a total of 19 coronavirus-related deaths have occurred in Soite’s area 

The key fig­ures of the coro­n­avirus sit­u­a­tion­al pic­ture will be updat­ed next time on Tues­day 19th of April. 

Instruc­tions  

The risk of infec­tion in the Soite area is now very high, and we would once more like to remind every­one of the impor­tance of the coro­n­avirus safe­ty pro­ce­dures. In order to min­i­mize the risk of infec­tion, it is still impor­tant to fol­low the coro­n­avirus hygiene rec­om­men­da­tions i.e. wash your hands, use a pro­tec­tive mask and main­tain a safe­ty dis­tance. You can go to work or school only if you are com­plete­ly healthy. We would like to remind every­one that an exten­sive facial mask rec­om­men­da­tion is in effect with­in Soite’s area. 

A rec­om­men­da­tion about remote work is also still in effect with­in Soite’s area. It is rec­om­mend­ed that employ­ers uti­lize the hybrid mod­el for remote work at work­places so that employ­ees take turns to work from home part of the time, as far as this is pos­si­ble, so that not every­one is at the work place simultaneously. 

Home test­ing is rec­om­mend­ed as the pri­ma­ry method for con­firm­ing a coro­n­avirus infec­tion. Home tests are rec­om­mend­ed for any­one who has symp­toms of a res­pi­ra­to­ry infec­tion, such as a fever, a run­ny nose or a cough. We rec­om­mend repeat­ing the home test again after a few days if the symp­toms of res­pi­ra­to­ry infec­tion persist. 

If the coro­n­avirus test is pos­i­tive, you should stay in home iso­la­tion. The dura­tion of iso­la­tion at home for a per­son who has become ill is 5 days start­ing from the day their symp­toms began or the day they were test­ed, regard­less of vac­ci­na­tion pro­tec­tion. The day the symp­toms began or the day the per­son is test­ed is count­ed as day 0. Dur­ing the dura­tion of the home iso­la­tion, you have to avoid all con­tacts out­side your home. 

If you con­tact your occu­pa­tion­al health ser­vices or health cen­tral, they can write a sick leave cer­tifi­cate for 5 days based on a home test. The Act is in effect from 28th of Feb­ru­ary to 30th of June 2022. Read more in the mes­sage on the Finnish Government’s web­site (in Finnish). 

If you have received a pos­i­tive result from a home test and are gen­er­al­ly healthy, have mild res­pi­ra­to­ry symp­toms and over­all are feel­ing well, you do not gen­er­al­ly need to con­tact the health­care ser­vices or seek out coro­n­avirus test­ing with­in the health­care services. 

If you need a med­ical cer­tifi­cate A for sick­ness allowance on account of an infec­tious dis­ease for your employ­er, a pos­i­tive home test result has to be con­firmed with­in the health care ser­vices. Due to the Health Insur­ance Act being changed, you have to con­tact your own occu­pa­tion­al health ser­vices or health cen­tral for a med­ical cer­tifi­cate A. Soite’s Infec­tion Con­trol Unit no longer issues med­ical cer­tifi­cates A. 

Cur­rent instruc­tions are found on Soite’s coro­n­avirus website: 

• If you suspect an infection, follow these instructions 
• Treating a Coronavirus Infection at Home 
• Instructions for people who have COVID-19 

Vac­ci­na­tions

It is espe­cial­ly impor­tant to take the coro­n­avirus vac­cine now that the quick­ly spread­ing omi­cron vari­ant is present in the area, as the vac­cine pro­tects you from seri­ous forms of coro­n­avirus dis­ease in par­tic­u­lar. Please take the coro­n­avirus vac­cine as soon as pos­si­ble if you have not yet done so, or if you have not yet tak­en the boost­er vac­cine doses. 

Coro­n­avirus vac­ci­na­tions are giv­en as follows: 

·       Coro­n­avirus vac­ci­na­tions are now pro­gress­ing with regards to all per­sons over the age of 5 who live in Soite’s area. The sec­ond dose can be giv­en when at least six weeks have passed since the first vac­ci­na­tion.

 

·       A third vac­cine dose is giv­en to every­one over the age of 60 and to per­sons who belong to med­ical risk groups and who are at least 18 years or old­er if at least 3 months have passed since they received the sec­ond dose.

‘·      A third vac­cine dose is giv­en to every­one aged 18 to 59 years if at least 4 months have passed since they received the sec­ond dose. 

·       A third vac­cine dose is giv­en to 12—17-year-olds who belong to a risk group if at least 6 months have passed since the sec­ond dose. A third dose can also be giv­en to oth­er 12–17-year-olds if it is need­ed for oth­er than med­ical rea­sons, for exam­ple before trav­el­ing somewhere. 

·         A third dose is also giv­en to per­sons aged 12 and old­er who have a severe immun­od­e­fi­cien­cy, if at least 2 months have passed since the sec­ond vac­ci­na­tion.

 

·         A fourth dose is giv­en to per­sons aged 12 and old­er who have a severe immun­od­e­fi­cien­cy, if at least 3 months have passed since the third vaccination. 

·       A fourth dose is giv­en to per­sons aged 80 and old­er as well as to elder­ly res­i­dents at nurs­ing homes, if at least 3 months have passed since the third vac­ci­na­tion.

 

·       Coro­n­avirus vac­ci­na­tions for chil­dren aged 5 to 11 will be arranged by appoint­ment at Soite’s vac­ci­na­tion cen­trals. You can book an appoint­ment via Soite’s online Oma­hoito ser­vice: https://soite.terveytesi.fi/citizenportal/#/login. When 5–11 year old chil­dren are vac­ci­nat­ed, con­sent is need­ed by both parents. 

Nat­u­ral­ly, first dos­es of the vac­cine are also still being dis­trib­uted and we encour­age you to seek out coro­n­avirus vac­ci­na­tion if you are com­plete­ly unvac­ci­nat­ed. The coro­n­avirus is not going away and it will be very dif­fi­cult to avoid the dis­ease in the future. It is sig­nif­i­cant­ly safer to encounter the coro­n­avirus if you are vac­ci­nat­ed. 

Soite’s coro­na vac­ci­na­tion indi­ca­tor has been updat­ed! In total, 90.6% of the cit­i­zens in the Soite area over the age of 18 have now received their first vac­cine dose. 88.4 per­cent of per­sons over the age of 18 in the area have received their sec­ond vac­ci­na­tion dose. As many as 65.7 per­cent of per­sons over the age of 18 in the area have received their third vac­ci­na­tion dose. 

Vac­ci­na­tions are giv­en main­ly dur­ing walk-in vac­ci­na­tion days with­out appoint­ment book­ing, which means you can come to a coro­n­avirus vac­ci­na­tion when it suits you best.

This week, vac­ci­na­tion days with­out appoint­ment book­ing are organized: 

• 11th of April 9 am – 7.30 pm the vaccination central in Kokkola (Kaarlelankatu 7). Vaccines: Pfizer and Moderna.
• 12th of April 9.30 am – 2.30 pm Lohtaja health station (Lohtajantie 3). Vaccines: Pfizer and Moderna.
• 12th of April 3 pm – 6 pm Teerijärvi health station (Hörbyntie 8). Vaccine: Pfizer.
• 13th of April 8.30 am – 3.30 pm Kannus seurakuntakeskus (the parish centre) (Valtakatu 20). Vaccines: Pfizer and Moderna.
• 13th of April 9 am – 7.30 pm the vaccination central in Kokkola (Kaarlelankatu 7). Vaccines: Pfizer and Moderna.
• 13th of April 10.15 am – 4.20 pm the vaccination central in Perhonjokilaakso (Kirkkotanhua 1, Veteli). Vaccine: Pfizer.
• 14th of April 8.30 am – 3 pm Toholampi seurakuntakoti (parish house) (Lampintie 7). Vaccine: Pfizer and Moderna.
• 14th of April 12 noon – 1.45 pm, Perho health care centre (Vanhainkodintie 20). Vaccine: Pfizer.
• Additional information and the timetable for the walk-in days can be found on Soite’s coronavirus website: https://korona.soite.fi/en/the-coronavirus-vaccines/ 

An appoint­ment for a coro­n­avirus vac­ci­na­tion may still be booked online on https://soite.terveytesi.fi/ or by phone on the num­ber 06 828 7488. Phone hours Mon­day to Thurs­day from 9 am to 3 pm. You can also book an appoint­ment via your health centre.