Terschelling campsite infections rise to eight as fears for second wave mount

Terschelling has few roads. Photo: Holland.com
Photo: Holland.com

The number of youngsters who have tested positive for coronavirus after a stay at campsite Appelhof in the Wadden island of Terschelling has risen to eight.

Two boys from Noord-Holland were found to be infected on Wednesday prompting the owner to close the campsite from Monday August 17,  two weeks before the end of the season. The other youngsters are from across the country, health board GGD Fryslân has said.

A testing facility will be opened in the island so others with mild symptoms staying at the campsite can be tested, as well as locals. The health board says it can test up to 100 people and have the results on the same day.

‘It wasn’t really a matter of if but when the virus would come to Terschelling,’ acting mayor Jon Hermans-Vloedbeld told local broadcaster Omrop Fryslân. ‘The islands are full to bursting so it’s not surprising.’

Hermans-Vloedbeld said the events should be a ‘wake-up call’ for tourists and tourist facilities to keep to the rules and urged people to wear face masks in busy places.

Second wave

Meanwhile fears for a second wave are mounting. ‘If things continue in the way they have we could have a second wave on our hands as early as September,’ Diederik Gommers, chairman of the acute care association, told current affairs programme Op1 on Wednesday.

In the last few days the number of intensive care patients, which had been a steady 20 for the last two weeks in July, has jumped from to 35, Gommers said, and hospital admissions have risen from 92 to 115.

The plan was to increase the number of intensive care beds to 1,350 by October 1 and to 1,700 by January 1, Gommers said. However, if a second wave comes earlier, he said, intensive care wards will not be able to cope.

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