‘California is in a crisis.’ Overwhelmed hospitals beg families to avoid holiday gatherings
In an extraordinary plea, California’s major health care providers on Tuesday called on residents to resist the temptation to hold in-home family Christmas gatherings this week, saying those events will trigger yet another surge on top of an existing wave of new COVID-19 infections.
Sutter Health, Kaiser Permanente and Dignity Health, operators of major hospitals statewide, held a joint call to plead with residents to “take stringent, common sense precautions” in the coming days, warning that intensive care units and emergency rooms already are jammed with record numbers of patients and can’t handle much more.
They’re calling it a “Don’t Share Your Air” campaign for the Christmas and New Year’s period. State officials said the current record numbers of hospital patients stems in good part from family gatherings during Thanksgiving, in defiance of state mandates not to hold get-togethers in family homes.
“We are at or near capacity everywhere,” Greg Adams, chairman and CEO of Kaiser Permanente said. “As the bed count continues to dwindle we simply will not be able to keep up if the COVID-19 surge continues to increase.”
Health care workers have described their battle against COVID-19 as a hidden fight, happening in hospital corridors that the public doesn’t see, but one that has left staff exhausted and at times demoralized.
“California is in a crisis mode in its health systems,” said Thomas McGinn, an executive with Dignity Health. “We are breaking records we do not want to break.”
As of Tuesday, California was approaching 23,000 COVID-19 deaths since March. Nearly 18,000 people were hospitalized with the virus and 3,755 were in intensive care units – both records since the pandemic began. California has seen one of the most dramatic surges in hospitalizations in the nation; two months ago, there were 2,300 coronavirus patients in California hospitals.
The surge is also hitting the state’s ICUs. More than 98% of the state is under a strict stay-at-home order linked to dwindling ICU capacity; the state’s ICU capacity stood at just 1.4%.
“We’re asking you to make a choice to give a gift to your family, your communities and those hospital personnel who give it their all every single day to take care of not just COVID-19 patients,” but others who are ill or injured in the hospital, said Dr. Mark Ghaly, secretary of California Health and Human Services Agency, and Gov. Gavin Newsom’s top health official.
“Let’s make some choices over the next 10 days that we will never regret.”
If people insist on getting together for Christmas, health officials said the event should be outdoors. People should wear masks and events should be brief.
Lack of doctors, nurses, equipment
The problem health officials face is more a lack of doctors and nurses than a lack of space, as well as exhaustion among healthcare workers. Some hospitals that normally have one ICU, now have set up second and third ICUs on site.
The sudden patient increase in November and December, after a relatively calm September and October, has forced the state to send federal and state medical SWAT teams to many hospitals and prompted the state again this week to implore retired medical professionals to volunteer to help out.
Some hospitals have resorted to treating virus patients in hallways, lobbies and parking lot tents.
The California Department of Public Health on Tuesday reported that Southern California and San Joaquin Valley hospital intensive care units are filled to capacity.
In the greater Sacramento region, made up of 13 counties, ICU capacity is fluctuating daily and is currently at 16%. The state has opened Sleep Train Arena in North Natomas to treat several dozen COVID-19 patients, sent there by overwhelmed local hospitals.
Hospitals report they have launched “surge” plans that include treating ICU-level patients in emergency rooms, post-surgical areas and in pediatric intensive care areas.
The surge of coronavirus infections stemming in part from Thanksgiving and other gatherings has already put the state’s health care system under an unprecedented strain in the last month. Some people who normally should be treated in the hospital are being sent oxygen tanks to use at home and are given periodic check-ins from health care workers.
This week’s pleas though are coming too late for many people.
Already, this past weekend, millions of people a day took airline flights, most heading to family gatherings. Sunday was the third day in a row that saw more than a million people pass through airport security checkpoints — marking the first time airports have screened more than 1 million passengers since Nov. 29, according to the Transportation Security Administration.
This story was originally published December 22, 2020 at 12:23 PM.