The Tarrant County Department of Public Health said the county’s ICUs were at 97% capacity on Wednesday, while adding 3,410 new cases of COVID-19 along with 12 more deaths.
According to the TCPH COVID-19 panel, there were 1,489 COVID-19 patients in municipal hospitals as of Tuesday, 73 more than on Monday. COVID-19 patients represent 29% of all patients in the municipal hospital and 25.4% of all hospital patients in the TSA-E. The total bed occupancy rate for all hospital beds in the municipality is now 87%, down 3% from Tuesday. The ICU capacity for adults in Tarrant County has decreased to 97% according to the TCPH COVID-19 panel.
Although the hospital’s capacity is approaching close to 100%, officials last week emphasized that they have expansion plans to expand capacity, if necessary.
“Hospitals have pandemic plans. Don’t let me scare people, that they don’t know or don’t have the capacity. They do, but do you really want to expand that capacity? We already know that we are short of employees,” said Vinnu Taneja, Director of Tarrant County Public Health on Tuesday. “Staff have been working at the hospital for almost 10 months, dealing with many COVID and illnesses. They are tired. Some of them had COVID, family with COVID, some of them died. So, do you really want to stretch that capacity? “
If you want to register to receive the COVID-19 vaccination in Tarrant County, click here for more information.
In the past seven days, the municipality announced 18,400 new and probable cases of the virus or an average of 2,628 per day. Data from the county health department indicated that there were 2,777 more confirmed cases than the most recent report and 633 more likely cases. To date, the county has reported 144,103 confirmed cases of the virus and 21,185 probable cases for a total of 165,288 cases.
The county is also reporting another 1,799 estimated recoveries, bringing the total number of survivors to 118,933. There are currently about 44,794 active cases in the county, most of any county in northern Texas.
The latest victims included an Arlington man in his 90s, an Euless man in his 90s, a Fort Worth woman in his 90s, a Hurst woman in his 90s, a woman from the unincorporated county of Tarrant in 90s, a North Richland Hills woman in her 80s, an Arlington woman in her 80s, a Bedford man in her 80s, a Mansfield man in her 80s, two Fort Worth women in her 80s and an Arlington man in his 60s. Everyone had underlying health problems.
TCPH now reports 1,561 deaths attributed to the virus since March 2020.
County officials also said on Wednesday that 9,390 vaccines had been distributed in the county.
Tarrant County, which extended its mask mandate until February 28, 2021, began reporting probable and confirmed cases of COVID-19 in August 2020 at the request of the state health department. Probable cases, the county said, are responsible for a variety of real-world situations and can highlight cases in the community that would not otherwise be reported.
COVID-19 causes a respiratory illness with cough, fever and shortness of breath and can cause bronchitis, severe pneumonia or even death. For more information, go to coronavirus.tarrantcounty.com or call the Tarrant County Public Health information line, 817-248-6299, 24 hours a day, seven days a week.