North African refugees, fleeing the fighting, admitted to Sicilian hospitals from January 1st to June 10th, 2011.

摘要

As declared on June 1st 2011 by Italian Minister Maroni, many boats have transported about 42,000 Africans (90% men) fleeing the fighting, almost all to Lampedusa, a small island off Italy's southern coast, from January 1st to June 10th, 2011. Mostly were Tunisians, Nigerians, Ethiopians, Eritreans and Somalis. All patients who needed hospital-ization were transported by the "Emergency 118 Helicopter Service", to those Sicilian hospitals in which beds were reserved for this purpose. A prospective analysis of migrants' admissions in Sicilian hospitals was carried out. Patients were classified according to the admission diagnosis reported on medical records of 118 and data were aggregated according to: disease, sex and ward in which hospitalization was required. 97 patients required hospi-talization in 6 Sicilian hospitals: females/males ratio was 57/40.