Greece's relevant health minister on Tuesday, speaking during a nationally televised press conference, said the Covid-19 infection rate in the northern city of Thessaloniki exceeds 30 percent, meaning that roughly one in three residents tested would turn up positive.
Health Minister Vassilis Kikilias, a physician by training and former pro basketball player, cited research by the city's Aristotle University as calculating the positive rate at 32 percent.
The greater Thessaloniki was placed in a lockdown a week before the rest of the country was placed in a similar regime for three weeks. He added that the country's health care system is on in a critical mode.
However, he called same-day reports claiming that staff at the city's AHEPA hospital are now obliged to select which patients are intubated in ICUs as fake news.
Kikilias said the country's public health care system now fields 1,083 ICU spots, with another 234 ready by the end of the year.
In a bid to deflect opposition criticism, the minister claimed his center-right inherited 557 ICU beds in July 2019, while the number will rise to 1,316 by the end of the year.
