Cantonal hospital becomes the Zug Corona Hospital

So far - as of Monday afternoon - there have been no hospitalisations due to the Corona virus. Should this change, however, the Zug Cantonal Hospital in Baar will take care of the cases. The two Zug hospitals - the Andreas Clinic and the Zug Cantonal Hospital - have now announced this. For about two weeks now, they have been working together intensively to deal with the pandemic Covid-19, and they published the most important key data together with the canton yesterday. "We called this press conference because there is an interest among the population to know what it would be like if the patient situation suddenly becomes like that in Italy," explains Martin Pfister, Minister of Health in Zug.

"Our goal is to have sufficient capacity when many Covid-19 patients need treatment." Because the treatment of other patients must also be ensured at the same time. "The spatial separation of the Covid 19 patients is possible and easy to implement in the cantonal hospital," explains cantonal hospital director Matthias Winistörfer. Such a case was planned for when the hospital was built. "So we can use existing concepts."

Should the number of Covid 19 patients in the cantonal hospital increase sharply, as can be expected, non-urgent interventions will be postponed. Urgent cases will be taken over in this case by the Andreas Clinic. According to Winistörfer, some treatments will nevertheless continue to be offered in Baar at any time. "Dialysis, for example, is only offered by us in the canton of Zug." The emergency treatment will also continue, and the birth department will only be relocated to Cham if there is a high escalation level.

Press conference in the government building in Zug: cantonal doctor Rudolf Hauri, health director Martin Pfister, Matthias Winistörfer, director of the Cantonal Hospital Zug and Jonas Zollinger, director of Andreas Clinic.

Andreas Clinic Director Jonas Zollinger appeals to the population not to complicate the work of the hospital. "We will actively approach patients should procedures or treatments be postponed." He also asks the population not to make any inquiries by email or phone. "This can lead to an overload for us." The regime could create around 100 places for Covid-19 patients in the canton of Zug. The cantonal hospital currently has eight intensive care units, in which a total of three people can be ventilated, according to Winistörfer. With the help of additional material and specialists from the Andreas Clinic, a total of 16 intensive care units with ventilation can be set up, according to Winistörfer.

Cantonal doctor Rudolf Hauri calls on the population to do everything possible to avoid contacts with other people. "With each contact less, our canton will be less affected." However, as all contacts can never be prevented, it’s all the more important to follow the hygiene measures. As of Monday afternoon, there were 24 confirmed Covid-19 cases in the canton of Zug. According to the Cantonal Doctor Hauri, the number of unreported cases can hardly be estimated.

Stop of visits in retirement and nursing homes
As of Monday, the canton has decided that a ban for visitors will apply to all retirement and nursing homes in the Canton of Zug. The management of the respective institution may, however, grant exceptions to the ban on visits in individual cases.