Austria : Decreasing number of Hospital Beds and ICU Beds

This article explains the current situation of hospital beds in the country. You will discover the current  number of regular hospital beds, of intensive care unit beds (ICU beds) and of medical care personnel in Austria. All data was researched in official databases, in particular in the publications of Statistik Austria, the national statistical institute. In august 2024, no report of Statistik Austria was available for the year 2023. Therefore, the most recent data refers to 2022.

Historic moment in Salzburg in 2021: A hospital triage team was put in operational readiness

Triage : This french word for « selection/ sorting » is one of the most brutal ones in the context of health care. It means, that the available resources (medical staff, hospital beds, medical devices, medicaments etc) do not suffer to treat all patients that require care in a certain situation. 

The task of a « triage team » is to « prioritize » certain patients over others, if necessary. Such a « prioritisation « means that the other patient gets excluded from an immediate and direct help. What happens to this « not prioritary « patient ? In the best case, he gets put on hold, for a treatment at a later moment (if he is still alive). What will happen in the worst case ?

Concrete questions a « triage team » might be confronted to can be as follows:

« Which patient is prioritary for a hospital bed ? The 50-year old family father, or the 80 year old grandmother ? »  (Potential triage situation)

« Which patient has the priority for an intensive care unit bed ? The 15 year old teen who had a car accident, or the 50 year old cancer patient ? » (potential triage situation)

« Which patient is prioritary for a hospital bed ? The 50 year old construction worker, or the 50 year old businessman ? »  (potential triage situation)

In 2021, the association of hospitals in the austrian region of Salzburg put a triage team in place, in the context of the Corona situation in Austria. The governor of the region Salzburg in the period 2013 – 2024 is the Christian Democrat Wilfried Haslauer (ÖVP party). 

How many hospital beds does Austria have ? The reduction started in the 1980ies.

The following chart from the World Bank shows the continuous reduction of hospital beds since the 1980ies. In 1985, there were still 10,9 hospital beds for 1000 citizens. Between 1985 and 2000, this number was reduced to 8 hospital beds for 1000 citizens.

There was a drastic reduction of hospital beds between 1985 and 2000. Let’s now check how the situation of hospital beds has evolved since 2020.

The current number of hospital beds in Austria. How much less beds are there since the Covid Year 2020 ?

Data from Statistik Austria shows, that the reduction of hospital beds continued during the last years too. The concrete number of hospital beds can be consulted in the « Jahrbuch der Gesundheitsstatistik » of Statistik Austria for the respective years.

In the Covid year 2020 there were still 7,1 hospital beds per 1000 citizens. In 2022, the number is only 6,7 beds. 

The reduction can be seen in the total numbers too :  in 2020 there were still 62 873 hospital beds, in 2022 their number was only 60 739.

During the same period (2020 to 2022), the total population of Austria has increased, and the percentage of citizens aged +65 years raised too (from 19% to 19,40% of the total population). See all details in the chart below :

How many ICU beds does Austria have ? How much less are there since 2020 ?

The chart above allows to identify as well the reduction of Intensive Care Unit Beds (ICU Beds). 

In 2020, there were still 2635 ICU beds. 

In 2022, the number is 2609 ICU beds (a reduction of 26 ICU hospital beds) !

As with regular hospital beds, the following statement is to be done: after Covid, there are less ICU beds for a bigger total population and a higher percentage of old and vulnerable people.

The big picture : Hospital beds are very important, but there are other relevant questions too.  

During the Covid, lockdown and triage period, citizens often heard the phrase « There are too few hospital beds for too many ill people ». The reality is of course more complex.

The question of the hospital bed number is linked to many other questions :

How many physicians and nurses are available ? What is the right mixture of general practicioners (that can do prophylactical work and provide a low-threshold care for patients with simple symptoms) and hospital physicians (that treat the serious cases) ?

What are the details of nosocomial infections in hospitals : their total number and association with certain treatment methods ? (Concrete data on nosocomial infections is very difficult to obtain. Why ?)

How high is the percentage of old and vulnerable people in the society ? How many intensive care beds are necessary with regard to the concrete and future percentage of old people ?

What are the details of the national health expenditure : how much money is spent i.e. on PCR tests for Covid testing, and how much money is spent for modern medical machines such as tumor scanners etc ?

Which treatments are proposed for certain diseases ? Are there known medicaments that can be used for a treatment or not ? If new vaccines are proposed : What are their market authorisation details (regular market approval or conditional market approval ?) ? How high is the number of suspected adverse drug reactions of vaccines with a conditional market authorisation ?

What is the impact on general public health caused by unusual stress of the population due to political measures such as repeated lockdowns and announcements of Triage Teams in hospitals ?

Are there delayed preventive medical checks (for example concerning heart diseases or cancers) due to political measures (lockdowns, special hospital protocols etc) ? If yes, what is the impact of such measures on the incidence of certain diseases ?

The chart above with pluriannual health care data from 2010 to 2024 allows to better understand some parametres that are necessary to appreciate questions such as excess mortality and the right number of ICU beds. Take a few minutes to look at it.

How many general medical personnel work in Austria’s hospitals ? How much less are there since 2020 ?

This category of medical care workers in hospitals concerns midwifes, nurses, radiology assistants, physiotherapists etc. (physicians are counted in another chart). The evolution of the number of this staff category is impressive.

In 2020, there were still 96 796 hospital employees, but in 2022 the number has dropped to 60 896. All nine regions of Austria are concerned by this drastic decline.

Let’s remind that the duration of professional training for this vocational group is between 1 year (for a medical care assistant) and 3 years (for a nurse with a bachelor degree).

How many physicians work in austrian hospitals ?

Reminder : from 2020 to 2022, the total population grew in number, as well as the percentage of the population segment +65 years.

The total number of physicians working in austrian hospitals increased from 26 047 in 2020 to 26 309 in 2022.

A statistical breakdown of the number of hospital physicians per 100 000 inhabitants reveals the following data (based on the total population on 1st january 2020 and 2022) :

In 2020, there is a national average of 292,63 hospital physicians for 100 000 austrian citizens.

In 2022, there is a national average of 293,01 hospital physicians for 100 000 austrian citizens.

Let’s highlight some regional results too :

Vienna has the highest hospital physician density of all 9 regions. In 2020, there were 370,34 hospital physicians for 100 000 citizens. In 2022, this value declined to 359,03.

In 2020 there were 7078 physicians in Vienna’s hospitals (with 4155 specialized physicians).

In 2022, there were 6935 physicians in Vienna’s hospitals (with 4128 specialised doctors).

Salzburg has the second best hospital physician density in Austria (after Vienna) : 345,98 in 2020, and 348,02 in 2022. This is an interesting fact with regard to the deployment of a triage team in this region.

Lower Austria is the biggest austrian region after Vienna. Its hospital physician density has improved from 248,35 (in 2020) to 257,01 (in 2022), but it is still below the national average of 293,01 (for the year 2022).

Burgenland has the lowest number of hospital physicians of all 9 regions. In 2020, the value is 228,23 hospital physicians for 100 000 citizens. In 2022, this value declined to 225,82.

The values for the other regions in 2022 are : Carinthia = 277,41/ Upper Austria = 264,23/ Styria = 255,24/ Tyrol = 341,58/ Vorarlberg = 255,68.

The governors of the regions Burgenland and Vienna for the relevant period come from the SPÖ party : Burgenland’s governor is the Social Democrat Hans Peter Doskozil (since 2019), Vienna’s mayor and governor is the Social Democrat Michael Ludwig (since 2018). The governor of Lower Austria since 2017 is the Christian Democrat Johanna Mikl-Leitner (ÖVP).  

How many physicians work in Austria ?

This data of Statistik Austria is defined as « physicians that are registered with the austrian chamber of physicians ».

The number of physicians per 100 000 inhabitants increased from 533,7 in 2020 to 543,9 in 2022. The total numbers are as follows : 47 674 physicians in 2020, and  49 521 physicians in 2022.

A closer look on the statistics shows, that the number of specialized physicians increased in all 9 regions, while the number of general practicioners has declined in most regions (with the exceptions of Tyrol, Vorarlberg and Vienna).

Who is responsible for hospitals in Austria ?

According to the website of the austrian ministry for health, there are shared responsibilities concerning the austrian health care system :

• the social insurance treats medical care outside of hospitals, and the areas of rehabilitation and medicaments
• the federal government is in charge of the basic law for hospitals and the « health system »
• the regional governments have the operational responsibility for hospitals

The following health care and medical data has been freely available to everybody :

• Since 1980 the number of hospital beds in Austria dropped continually.
• Since at least 2009 (date of the Swine Flu pandemic H1N1) everybody knew that the WHO can declare a pandemic at any time.
• Since at least 2012 and 2015 (years with a high excess mortality) everybody knew that there can be years with a peak in excess mortality. (In 2015 the excess mortality was 6,2% compared to the previous year – see the chart above in this article.)

Data research : The challenge of presenting reliable and understandable statistics.

Messages like « There are too few hospital beds, now there will be a triage team » are very simple. 

As mentioned in the section « the big picture » of this article, there is the challenge of asking much more questions than just the number of beds, if you want to understand a special period of the healthcare system.  

Another big challenge is the check of health care data in the official databases. Such research is quite complex already on the national level, and even more at an international level.

With « hospital beds «, a distinction of « regular hospital beds » and « intensive care unit hospital beds (ICU beds) » is necessary. In some databases there are even intermediary categories – which makes it difficult to realize serious international comparisons with other countries.

And then, even with a category such as « ICU Beds », Statistik Austria mentions 2 different types : « real ICU beds » (the data used in this article), and « systemized ICU beds ».

Even with the number of the national population there can be different values (the total population at the beginning of the year, and the average annual population).

Further difficulties for pluriannual statistics are : The data reporting style of statistical institutes may vary from one year to another. Some Website addresses (URL) might become inoperational too after a certain time span.

The same and/ or similar methodological challenges exist with many other data such as excess mortality, the « Covid death » definition etc.

If you appreciate serious, official and verifiable data analysis, then follow this blog !

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