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COVID-19 has brought some health care systems to 'the brink of failure,' doctors say
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The U.S. recorded more than 1 million cases of COVID-19 in the last seven days, Johns Hopkins University data shows, which is more than any other week since the pandemic began. There are 80,000 people currently hospitalized with COVID-19 and over 15,000 of these individuals are currently in intensive care units (ICUs) with nearly 5,000 on ventilators. These numbers are prodigious and make it clear to experts in the medical field that catastrophe in the health care world is not imminent — it has arrived.
“The health care system is overwhelmed and it is on the brink of failure,” says Dr. Kevin Doerschug, medical director of the University of Iowa’s medical intensive care unit. It’s an emergency that concerns not only shortages of staff and supplies, but of space. Based on data from COVID Exit Strategy, at least 30 states are using 70 percent or more of their hospital beds as of this week, and 29 are reporting ICUs with 25 percent capacity or less. Hospitals in Colorado, New Mexico, Indiana and North Dakota have reported either being on the verge of running out of beds or are already there.
Iowa is far from the only state in which hospitals are scrambling to keep up with the rising need for beds. A similar scene is playing out in Wisconsin, where more than 70 percent of hospital beds are full. In an attempt to prepare for more cases, Wisconsin officials have set up an alternative-care facility at an exhibition center outside Milwaukee called Wisconsin State Fair Park, where 23 patients are currently being treated.
Oguzhan Alagoz, a professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison who models the spread of infectious disease, says that in the wake of a spike in infections, hospitalizations will follow. While some have suggested that the lag time between COVID-19 cases rising and hospitalizations is 12 days, Alagoz believes the impact may come sooner. “My guess is it could be between five days to 10 days,” he posits.
Although his state is being hit particularly hard, Alagoz is most worried about North and South Dakota, two of the places where the virus has taken off. In South Dakota, ICUs are 83 percent full and averaging 1,400 new cases a day. Deb Fischer-Clemens, president of the South Dakota Nurses Association in Sioux Falls, is hopeful that they will find a way to keep treating patients, but she’s concerned. “We still have some levers to pull,” she believes, “But it’s scary. It’s...what happens next?”
Fischer-Clemens says that hospitals have had to get creative by “eliminating all surgeries” for a few days to free up nurses or open up makeshift ICUs in areas that were previously closed. But she worries that many health care workers are reaching a breaking point. “One of the concerning things I hear is, ‘How much longer can we keep doing this?’” says Fischer-Clemens. “It’s not just nurses, it’s the respiratory therapist, it’s the social workers, it’s the housekeepers, it’s everybody in the hospital that is on the frontlines.”
In Illinois, hospitals remain under 70 percent capacity — but with more than 600,000 cases in the state, doctors have already had to make adjustments. For example, one of the largest health systems in Illinois is canceling elective surgeries this week...
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