If you wish to visit patients at the MHH, you and we must continue to observe a number of important safety measures to protect our health. The state of Lower Saxony has issued a number of regulations for this purpose. The regulations for the MHH can be found here.

At the moment we are facing a virus that is currently untreatable. Also this time there will be considerations on possible vaccination strategies, but this will only help those who are not yet infected. That means, the treatment is limited to alleviating symptoms, i.e. to dampen strong febrile reactions with antipyretic drugs, to support the patient’s circulation and if breathing is difficult , oxygen is given.

In severe cases, patients are connected to a ventilator, which means that they are admitted to the intensive care unit in hospital. There they often have to be treated for a very long time, i.e. three to four weeks.

None of the drugs currently under public discussion, such as those for malaria, HIV or Ebola, are used by the MHH. These are all potentially effective, but the problem is that there are no reliable data on the effects and side effects of all these drugs in Covid-19 patients.

The big challenge for doctors and nurses is that this disease is different from those known to date. The course of the disease is extremely difficult to predict and is often wavelike - i.e. the patient is doing well and then suddenly the condition worsens again for a variety of reasons.

Risk factors are an age of 65 upwards with underlying conditions of the respiratory tract and the cardiovascular system, diabetes, overweight and high blood pressure. People of middle age can also become seriously ill, although this is rarer. Young people become ill only slightly in most of the cases; unfortunately, there are exceptions in which young people also have died.

According to the recommendations of the Robert Koch Institute, people with risk factors should first and foremost try to minimize the risk of infection as much as possible. So as for everyone else, the same applies here: Limit physical contact as much as possible, wash your hands often, keep your distance.

You should also be well informed about the clinical picture of COVID-19 in order to recognize the symptoms in time.

If you are ill, you should immediately contact your family doctor or General Practicioner (GP) - by telephone. You can also contact another advisory service such as the medical on-call service on tel. 116 117. You should clarify which individual measures you must now take or whether a COVID 19 test should be taken.

Even if cases of COVID-19 become known in your private or professional environment, this should be communicated accordingly in order to accelerate specific measures.

• The MHH Transplant Centre has compiled information for people with weakened immune systems.

• The HLTX e.V. - Verein für Herz-Lungen-Transplantation (association for heart-lung transplantation) has information especially for transplanted patients.

• For cancer patients, the Comprehensive Cancer Center (CCC Hannover) has put together a detailed overview here, which provides important information - including podcasts.

No. The “real” flu (influenza) is caused by the influenza virus, this is a completely different virus than the new coronavirus SARS-CoV-2 that is now circulating. Therefore, the influenza vaccination does not protect against an infection with SARS-CoV-2.

Because of the risks of infection in connection with Covid-19, the work of Protestant and Catholic pastoral care will be changed in the coming period: All services, devotions and events in the chapel of the MHH in building K6 will be cancelled until further notice. Pastoral work has been consistently converted to a "call-oriented", conciliar presence, which is limited to necessary visits: crisis support at the beginning and end of life (christening in the children's hospital, intensive care situations and palliative care). The pastoral workers remain available for patients and, if necessary, take on a representative function for their relatives.

In the same way, they remain responsive to the concerns of employees of all professions.

The 24-hour on-call service on all days of the week remains in place.

Pastoral care can be reached at:

Catholic Pastoral Care: 5405

Protestant pastoral care: 5474