The new year 2021 has started almost as the previous one ended: with the world immersed in the global Covid-19 pandemic that continues to expand and kill people.
In Finland, where vaccination began on 27 December as in the rest of the European Union member states, the coronavirus continues to be a threat, although in recent days the spread and incidence of new cases seem to have slowed down .
On Monday 4 January, Finland's health authorities reported 4 more deaths associated with the disease. These fatalities, recorded since New Year, bring the total death toll in Finland to 565, according to the National Institute for Health and Welfare (THL).
Most of the deaths (386) occurred in the Helsinki-Uusimaa region, the epicenter of the epidemic and the worst hit area.
Source: THL.
Vaccination
THL also reported 812 new infections diagnosed since the turn of the year, bringing Finland's total caseload to 36,919.
Specifically, 296 cases were reported on Friday 1 January; 201 cases on Saturday 2 January; 168 cases on Sunday 3 January and 147 cases on Monday 4 January.
According to THL's figures, so far 3,604 people have received the first doses of the vaccine, 1,081 of them in the Helsinki area and 1,115 in the Oulu region.
Source: THL.
Patients hospitalized
The number of people hospitalized due to the Covid-19 disease was 210 on Monday, on level with the previous week's numbers. Of them, 31 were admitted to intensive care units.
The country's incidence of new cases continues to decrease slightly. According to THL, at the time of writing this article it was 61.5 new infections per 100,000 inhabitants in the past two weeks for the whole country.
However, the situation varies depending on the region.
In the Helsinki-Uusimaa area, the most populated part of the country, the incidence for the preceding 14 days was 111.5 new cases per 100,000 inhabitants. The incidence of new cases also decreased in Southwest Finland (Turku and surroundings) to 106.3
In contrast, in the Lapland hospital district the incidence increased slightly, to 21.3 cases per 100,000 residents.
Currently, the lowest incidence in Finland is in the South Ostrobothnia hospital district, whose main city is Seinäjoki, where 6.2 new cases per 100,000 inhabitants have been diagnosed in the past 2-week period.
