The spring wave of the coronavirus pandemic has ended for Ukraine, Heath Minister Maksym Stepanov said on May 7.
The country managed to get through it with lesser losses than the scientists predicted. However, the third wave still became the deadliest so far, Stepanov said.
The third wave took the lives of at least 18,626 people from March 9 to May 6, according to the data released by the Health Ministry. This is significantly less than what the scientists of The National Academy of Science predicted in mid-March. According to their estimations, Ukraine was to lose 58,000 people to COVID-19 in spring.
According to their forecast, during the third wave, coronavirus would have been claiming the lives of 1,000 people daily to coronavirus. However, the actual death toll stood at around 300 daily.
The forecast was made just before a significant part of the country, including the city of Kyiv, went into lockdown. Kyiv was under a lockdown from March 20 to April 30.
The significant decrease in the number of new cases can be connected to the fact that Ukraine is in a holiday period. The days of May 3, 4 and 10 are days off, to compensate for the holidays of Orthodox Easter, International Workers Day and Victory Day that fall on weekends.
Ukraine’s daily COVID-19 cases, deaths and recoveries from March 1, 2021 to May 6, 2021. All data was released by the Ministry of Health.
Although Ukraine managed to avoid a catastrophe during the spring wave of the coronavirus pandemic, according to Stepanov, the country still suffered from shortages of oxygen, essential for coronavirus patients who have pneumonia and have difficulties breathing.
At the peak of the epidemic, 44,000 patients with coronavirus were on oxygen therapy in Ukrainian hospitals. A year ago, the capacity of all Ukrainian hospitals treating COVID-19 patients was just 3,500 beds, according to Stepanov.
As of May 7, Ukraine vaccinated 822,196 people with the first dose of the vaccine. Only 428 people are fully vaccinated in Ukraine, having received two doses.
