Crisis management in Slovakia needs to be more efficient

Crisis management in Slovakia needs to become more effective and proactive, Slovakia's chief hygienist Jan Mikas has told TASR. Mikas in this connection pointed out that the Public Health Office (UVZ) and regional public health offices employ roughly the same number of people as a large Slovak hospital. "And such a number of people fought alone against the coronavirus pandemic in five-million Slovakia in the first months," he said.
The chief hygienist stated that the first wave of the pandemic was eventually brought under control. "But then came difficult challenges, when the virus was different and arrived in Slovakia to a greater extent. Other forces had to be engaged [to fight against it] as well. Crisis management in Slovakia in general needs to be much more efficient and much more proactive," he said.
According to Mikas, the pandemic revealed UVZ's technological debt. "Some of the laboratory diagnostic equipment was outdated," he noted, adding that no investment in it has been made. During the pandemic, there was an attempt to take all steps needed to ensure basic and confirmatory diagnostics of the virus as quickly as possible. He pointed out that the diagnostics for SARS-CoV-2 were introduced in Slovakia by UVZ's National Influenza Reference Centre, and for a long time it was the only facility able to perform the task, being joined by other laboratories only later.
The chief hygienist stated that the public-health sector needs to obtain an amount of money that will enable it to equip itself with modern devices. In addition to other things, there's a need to build at least three BSL-3 laboratories and one BSL-4 laboratory in Slovakia, he added. (TASR)