The Second Wave of the coronavirus epidemic showed no signs of letting go today, with three deaths and high 168 newly diagnosed patients.

The deceased patients are from Skopje and Gostivar, aged 63, 66 and 70. One of the patients, a woman treated at the “8th of September” hospital, was only diagnosed with Covid-19 post-mortem. This brings the total death toll to 362.

There was a high level of testing – 1.470 tests were conducted, and as usual, about half of the newly diagnosed 168 patients were found in the capital Skopje. Tetovo remains the second worst affected city with 26 new patients. There are 3.656 active cases, nearly 2.000 of them in Skopje –  which is roughly the same level reported over the past few weeks. Cair, Skopje’s worst affected municipality, dropped below 400 active cases and now has 360. But other municipalities that have significant Muslim communities, in which social distancing norms were widely ignored during the month of Ramadan, did not register a drop – Gazi Baba even has a noticable increase with 210 active patients.

The two main clinics treating Covid-19 patients in Skopje admitted a high number of 25 new patients, and currently treat 184 patients, four of them on mechanical ventilation, and 62 on supplemental oxygen. This is a drop from the level of 220-250 hospitalized patients during the past weeks, but there are also 20 patients treated in the Kozle clinic, which serves as the third coronavirus ward in Skopje. The regional centers of Stip and Bitola have around 40 patients each – at the same level they’ve been for weeks, and there are also 110 coronavirus patients treated in general hospitals in Veles, Kumanovo, Prilep, Strumica and other cities.