Texas Gov. Greg Abbott speaking at a press conference at the Texas State Capitol in Austin on May 18, 2020.
Lynda M. Gonzalez-Pool | Getty Images
Texas Gov. Greg Abbott is calling for an additional 2,500 medical staff across the country to help ease the pressure on the state’s health care system imposed by Covid’s rise this summer.
Texas began asking for outside help just two weeks ago, when Abbott announced that the Texas State Department of Health Services had coordinated a first wave of more than 2,500 workers outside the state to respond to the delta variant. With this latest call, Texas will have approximately 8,100 external medical staff, including nurses and respiratory therapists.
Covid patients are currently occupying more than half of all intensive care beds in Texas as of Thursday, compared to 30 percent nationwide, according to the Department of Health and Human Services.
“The medical staff and equipment deployed by DSHS will provide crucial support to our healthcare facilities while treating hospitalized cases of COVID-19,” Abbott said in a statement.
The Texas State Department of Health Services also distributes fans, hospital beds, heart monitors and oxygen machines, according to the statement. More than a quarter of Texas’ nearly 52,000 hospitalized patients reported having coronavirus, HHS reported Thursday.
Texas also announced the opening of nine monoclonal antibody infusion centers earlier this month, offering current Covid patients a treatment option to limit serious illness and hospitalization. Abbott supports vaccines and the use of antibodies, but opposes the mandates of masks and vaccines, banning local governments and schools from adopting these requirements and threatening those who disobey with a $ 1,000 fine.
Although the rate of increase in cases has slowed recently in Texas, the state still reported a seven-day average of 16,970 new cases as of Wednesday, up 10% from last week, according to a CNBC data analysis from Johns Hopkins University. But health officials have warned that the slowdown in infection rates is not necessarily a reliable barometer of progress against coronavirus.
“I think it’s important to recognize that usually case rates increase and then stabilize, but unfortunately hospitalization rates increase later and stabilize later,” said Dr. Barbara Taylor, assistant dean and professor of infectious diseases. at the University of Texas Health Science Center in San Antonio, he said in an interview with CNBC. “It usually takes at least a couple of weeks.”