HONOLULU – Hawaii health workers say lack of government action worsens a parallel increase in coronavirus cases on the islands and, without effective policy changes, limited state hospitals could face a severe crisis.
“We will soon find ourselves in a situation where we will attend the ration,” said Dr. Jonathan Dworkin, an infectious disease specialist in Hawaii.
Dworkin said while the mandates may be unpopular, rationing Hawaii’s limited health resources “will be much uglier.”
“It involves making decisions about who lives and dies,” he said. “I hate the idea of having to make a decision about who will get oxygen.”
It may take another order to stay home, Dworkin said.
“I don’t like the idea of doing it, but we are in a situation where hospitals are very tense, where caring for patients who are not COVID is becoming very difficult, where we are in danger of being without oxygen. ”
Doctors across the state have made recommendations that say they could help Hawaii curb the spread of the delta variant.
They say the state has not implemented a number of measures officials agreed last year, including rapid testing, the installation of better air filtration systems in schools and businesses, and improved tracking. of contacts.
Some believe that a more robust screening process for travelers that includes two tests, one before the trip and one after the arrival, could also help curb the spread of the disease.
“That an island state does not take border control seriously is, in my view, an epidemiological crime,” Dworkin added. Still, “the best impact for strict border control would have been a few months ago.”
Prior to July, Hawaii reported a seven-day average of 46 cases daily. On Friday, that number was 881.
And, even as hospitals fill up and morgues carry portable body containers, leaders have made virtually no major policy changes.
The state recently announced that groups of more than 10 people could not gather indoors and 25 outdoors, but a party of more than 300 people that was broken up by police on a beach on Monday last week he had no appointment for violations of COVID-19.
A vaccination permit was announced for restaurants, bars and other businesses for Oahu, but this program will not begin for several weeks and the benefits of vaccine incentives could reach months.
Recently, the governor suggested that people stop traveling to Hawaii until the end of October, but did not change any official travel rules.
Gov. David Ige did not immediately respond to a message from the Associated Press on Thursday about health workers’ concerns.
The governor posted a video on social media asking people to act responsibly over the holiday weekend.
“The state of Hawaii is struggling with a disastrous and unprecedented increase in COVID-19 cases,” Ige said. “Our hospitals are being pushed to the limit.”
Ige asked travelers to do voluntary tests after arriving on the islands and for people to set up their own night curfews, avoid crowds and wear masks.
This week, the governor also silently signed an order relieving medical workers and hospitals of responsibility during the climb.
Hospitals and health workers “will be immune from civil liability for any death or injury … allegedly caused by any act or omission by the health institution,” the order said, with legal warnings, including misconduct and negligence.
Officials say only a small fraction of the cases have been directly related to tourists.
But hundreds of thousands of visitors and residents began traveling in July when travel rules were relaxed. Hotels and beaches were packed, local families gathered for parties and birthday gatherings, and tourists filled up with luaus and restaurants.
“Trips started to increase and we started to see how our cases increased,” said Dr. Kapono Chong-Hanssen, medical director of the Kauai Community Health Center. “And from there, you know, you really just saw that soaring rise in cases.”
State Department of Health director Dr Libby Char said there are likely to be missing cases among visitors who may not be tested while on holiday.
“Are we counting on travelers arriving or then getting sick? Yes, we probably are, “Char said.” If they don’t test, it makes it very difficult to identify these people. “
And now the delta variant has been ripping off unvaccinated residents of Hawaii. Although the state has one of the highest vaccination rates in the country, the increase has repeatedly set records for the highest number of cases and deaths since the start of the pandemic. Approximately 75% of Hawaii residents eligible for the vaccine are fully vaccinated, according to the state control panel. Children 11 years and under are not yet eligible for registration.
Hawaii had enjoyed the lowest infection, mortality, and hospitalization rates in the country before the delta eruption.
On the island of Kauai, where officials enacted strict rules that included a two-test screening process, the virus was virtually non-existent before resuming the trip.
The head of the Kauai State Department of Health, Dr. Janet Berreman, said tracking contacts on the island has shown that travel generates local outbreaks, and this is true for both visitors and residents. .
“When residents travel and return home, they often live in multigenerational homes. They go to work, they go to school, they see their friends. So a lot, a lot and a lot of transmission from one or two people in the home, ”Berreman said.
Another problem for hospitals is that now that hotels are full of tourists, the state has completed a program where rooms were made available for patients in need of quarantine.
“We have been able to help coordinate the discharge in hotel rooms where they could be safely quarantined until the end of the quarantine period, so that the risk of transmission, the risk of infection would be greatly reduced. and illness in her family members, ”said Jennifer Tucker, a practicing nurse at one of the state’s largest hospitals. “We do not have that option anymore. We are sending people home. “