Russia: We've escaped the worst scenario – Moscow mayor on COVID-19 outbreak

SHOT LIST
*NO CUTAWAYS AT SOURCE*
 
 
SOT Sergei Sobyanin, Moscow mayor (Russian):
“As we watch coronavirus spreading really fast in other countries and how health care system runs out of places to accommodate patients, we decided to develop a plan B. We have prepared such a medical facilities in order to be able to fight COVID-19. The worst scenario did not happen. We were really on the edge, but we have managed to escape it together.”
 
 
SOT Sergei Sobyanin, Moscow mayor (Russian):
“Speaking of death rate, which is widely discussed, not even death rate but lethality – how many have died of those infected. You can calculate any way for Moscow, you can combine any way, add how many died in common, anyway it’s a lot lower than in other cities and countries that faced such a tragedy. I would like to highlight it’s is the worst idea to calculate all this percentage saying who has more and who has less. This is our common tragedy and we should treat it as a tragedy and analyze what happened and what’s happening, how to minimize this deaths, this problems, this illnesses, and so on, and fight together without trying to find some miscalculations.”
 
 
SOT Sergei Sobyanin, Moscow mayor (Russian):
“Today many countries combine all the death rate data. [They say], if there’s rising mortality rate, let’s write it off as COVID-19. We can lump everything together, but no one will benefit, if there’s still nothing sliced and diced, no new methods applied, what [Russian] healthcare ministry did according to the World Health Organization recommendations, based on what was studied in Moscow. Best country’s and Moscow’s pathologists worked hard to get through all of this. And today according to the recommendations that you’ve listed, we stepped forward. There is one test in the world, a person dies with confirmed COVID-19, it means we listed him there. In fact this is much more complicated – it includes that a person has confirmed CIVID-19 test, really died of COVID-19, but it led to double pneumonia, for instance, and so on. So all the picture shows us directly that this person died because of COVID-19.”
 
SOT Sergei Sobyanin, Moscow mayor (Russian):
“We’ve done a lot, we have everything sliced and diced, we do not hide anything. Furthermore, we invite you, colleagues, let’s work together, we are sending you our recommendations, our point of view, if you don’t like it, please, come and talk not journalist to journalist, but leading world pathologist and our pathologist, let’s discuss who is right and who is wrong. Here are World Health Organization experts, world experts, and our experts – it’s all open, no problem. It should have been looked beneficial to us, let’s list all the additional 1900 deaths in April, let’s say it’s the COVID-19. We don’t want to do this, no, we should study how ambulance works, how hospital work, how medical centers work, - all the elements, we shouldn’t lump it together.”
 
SOT Sergei Sobyanin, Moscow mayor (Russian):
“Self protection regime, this sanitary restrictions will last for a long time, until we develop a vaccine. But it doesn’t mean we should spend our lives locked away. We should live our lives go shopping, talk to each other, walk, but stick to simple orders, which are rules in many countries.”
 
Mandatory courtesy: Rossiya 24 TV channel
SCRIPT
Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin comment on his efforts in fighting the coronavirus pandemic on Thursday, during a visit to the temporary hospital at the “Moscow” car dealer building.
 
The mayor said many Moscow hospital beds prepared for patients with COVID-19 luckily end up unfilled.
“As we watch coronavirus spreading really fast in other countries and how health care system runs out of places to accommodate patients, we decided to develop a plan B. We have prepared such medical facilities in order to be able to fight COVID-19. The worst scenario did not happen. We were really on the edge, but we have managed to escape it together,” Sobyanin highlighted.
 
He went on to comment on the complications involved with calculating the pandemic death toll. “Today many countries combine all the death rate data. [They say], if there’s rising mortality rate, let’s write it off as COVID-19,” the mayor said. He highlighted it’s better to have data “sliced and diced.”
“There is one test in the world, a person dies with confirmed COVID-19, it means we listed him there. In fact this is much more complicated – it includes that a person has confirmed CIVID-19 test, really died of COVID-19, but it led to double pneumonia, for instance, and so on,” he said.
 
Russia is currently the country with the third highest number of confirmed COVID-19 cases. According to Russian coronavirus headquarters, there are 379,051 infected in Russia, including 173,497 in Moscow.