Doctors dispute about crisis of the healthcare system of Armenia in fight against COVID-19

A transfer to outpatient (home) treatment of asymptomatic coronavirus patients stimulates an increase in COVID-19 incidence, said David Melik-Nubaryan, a teacher at the Yerevan Medical University. Home treatment should have been introduced from the very beginning so as not to spend the budget, Ruben Ovannisyan, an epidemiologist, believes.

The "Caucasian Knot" has reported that on May 25, wrote, Nikol Pashinyan, the Prime Minister of Armenia, stated that the second coronavirus wave had begun in the country, while Ovakim Zakaryan, a virologist, noted that the country's healthcare system was on the verge of crisis and would fail in the near future.

The healthcare system of Armenia has ceased to cope with the flow of coronavirus patients, and, therefore, has begun accepting only most difficult patients, Grant Mikaelyan, a scientific collaborator at the Caucasus Institute, believes, adding that the decision to treat asymptomatic patients at home is reducing the disease statistics and can lead to an increase in the number of infected people.

According to Mr Mikaelyan, the non-observance of quarantine measures was spreading along with the frivolous attitude towards COVID-19.

Contacts of asymptomatic patients with their family members stimulate the spread of the disease, Mr Melik-Nubaryan has noted. However, the treatment of asymptomatic patients at home is consistent with the recommendations of the World Health Organization (WHO), he has added.

Samvel Ovannisyan, the head of the Armenian Association of Family Physicians, has also noted that home treatment of asymptomatic patients is a widespread practice.