The Predicted COVID Surge Is Killing People!

Christmas was about three weeks ago, and now hospitals around the country are seeing the consequences of family gatherings. From small rural facilities to giant urban hospitals in southern California or Arizona, intensive care units are full and staff are exhausted. Many health experts worried about a predicted COVID surge two to three weeks after the holidays. Many people ignored the caution to stay home over the holidays. Sadly, we are now living with and dying from the consequences.

Rationing: “Death Panels” or “Triage Officers”?

The COVID surge has created such a strain on hospitals that doctors, nurses and ambulance teams are being forced to ration service. The US has not created “death panels” to triage patients, thank goodness. But some hospitals in Los Angeles are creating “triage officers” (Los Angeles Times, Jan. 8, 2021). 

“Stretched to the breaking point by a deluge of COVID-19 patients, Los Angeles County’s four public hospitals are preparing to take the extraordinary step of rationing care, with a team of “triage officers” set to decide which patients can benefit from continued treatment and which are beyond saving and should be allowed to die.”

Kaiser Health News reports (KHN, Jan. 5, 2021) that: 

“The situation in Los Angeles County hospitals is so critical that ambulance crews have been advised to cut back on their use of oxygen and to not bring to hospitals patients who have virtually no chance of survival. Officials say they need to focus on patients with a greater chance of surviving. The measures were taken as circumstances are expected to become even worse in coming weeks, when patients sickened over the Christmas holiday will need treatment, leaving officials desperate for ways to increase capacity and triage care to focus on the sickest patients.”

Arizona In Trouble!

Southern California is not the only place in terrible trouble. Arizona is also melting down. According to the New York Times (January 14, 2021):

“In Arizona over the past week, state officials have recorded the highest number of new coronavirus cases per capita in the country.

“Dr. Marjorie Bessel, chief clinical officer for the Banner Health hospitals in Arizona, warned on Wednesday that unless elected leaders and residents did more to stop the spread of the virus, five large health systems risked becoming overwhelmed with patients. More than two-thirds of the state’s intensive care units were full as of Monday, and the hospitals were preparing for a surge of 25 to 50 percent.”

Rural Hospitals Are Not Immune to the Predicted COVID Surge:

Earlier in the pandemic, small or remote health care organizations would send their sickest patients to tertiary care hospitals when they couldn’t handle them in house. Rural areas like Butler County, Kansas, Etowah County, Alabama, and Sevier County, Tennessee are experiencing a COVID surge.

Infectious disease expert, Dr. William Schaffner of Vanderbilt University, told the New York Times that “nearly 90 percent of Tennessee’s intensive care units were full” (January 14, 2021): 

“It’s taken a little while, but this highly contagious virus has now spread not only to the suburbs, but also to rural areas. In Tennessee, we have some very rural counties, and there’s no county that’s unaffected.”

Doctors in rural areas who want to send very sick patients to larger health care facilities are stymied. The referral hospitals just don’t have room or health care workers to accommodate additional patients from outside the community. Many can barely manage their own patients.

Although the COVID-19 vaccination program is beginning to gather momentum, infections are spreading more quickly than ever. It will likely be a few more weeks before hospitals get past the holiday COVID surge.