MISSION VIEJO, Calif. (Reuters) – Southern California is so overwhelmed by coronavirus cases that it backs up patients trying to get into hospitals and corpses get trapped on another trampoline once they come out.
At an Orange County hospital, patient-laden ambulances are placed outside waiting for space in the intensive care unit and COVID-19 patients fill the emergency hallway.
In nearby Los Angeles County, where people die from the disease at a rate of one every eight minutes, and in other heavily affected areas, refrigerated trailers will be brought in to provide additional corpse storage capacity.
“When we fill up with patients with COVID, we can’t take care of the community at large,” said Dr. Jim Keany, 54, managing partner of emergency physicians at Mission Viejo’s Providence Mission Hospital. “All the beds are full, all the nurses and doctors are busy caring for patients with COVID.”
A patient waited in the ambulance more than five hours before being admitted, Keany said.
Despite strict home stay measures that were fortified in most of the state last month, California, the most populous state with nearly 40 million people, leads the United States with about 2, 6 million cases of COVID-19, more than a million more than the next state, according to an official Reuters count.
The death toll of more than 28,000 tracks only those in New York and Texas.
With the accumulation of bodies, the California Office of Emergency Services said it arranged to ship 88 trailers to needy areas across the state.
The headquarters of the Los Angeles County Forensic Office will receive 10 morgue trailers, in addition to the 12 established there in April, spokeswoman Sarah Ardalani said.
Orange County officials had allowed hospitals to divert patients to other locations when they were full, but now that virtually all hospitals have reached capacity, this policy has been overturned, leading to long waiting times for treatment. , said Keany.
“We’re pushing our carpenters and facility people to one end to try to build a space where we can manage patients,” Keany said.
Dr. Robert Goldberg, 44, a pulmonary and critical care physician at Providence Mission Hospital, called on the public to help reduce the threat by wearing masks, maintaining social distance and getting the vaccine a once available.
“COVID is real. It’s potentially deadly, “Goldberg said.” People of all ages die. We have to work together. We have to spend it together. “
Report by Lucy Nicholson; Additional reports by Steve Gorman and Jane Ross; Written by Daniel Trotta; Edited by William Mallard