(CNN) – Even if you don’t have coronavirus, the record for hospitalizations for COVID-19 can have a devastating impact on you.
“If you are in a car accident, you will want us to save your life,” said Dr. Brad Spellberg, medical director of the Los Angeles County-University of Southern California Medical Center.
“If you have a heart attack or stroke, you will want a bed in the ICU with nurses and ICU-trained doctors who do not care for 20 other patients at the same time.”
Some hospitals in the United States began to run out of health workers months ago. But holiday meetings are fueling new waves of COVID-19 hospitalizations.
“We are seeing people who got together for Thanksgiving Day, or who got together for other reasons (and) didn’t really understand, even up to this point, what was at stake,” said Spellberg.
Across the country, 125,379 people were hospitalized with COVID-19 on Thursday, more than any other day in the pandemic, according to the COVID tracking project. The number of patients exceeded 125,000 on Friday as well. The US has already remained above 100,000 hospitalizations for 31 consecutive days.
“This is a total collapse of the health care system if there is another peak,” said Spellberg.
“And we, at the hospital, cannot prevent this. We can only react to that. It is the public that has the power to stop the spread of this virus, obeying the public health guidelines published. “
Offices and a break room become patient rooms
California emergency officials said hospitals are treating an “unprecedented” number of COVID-19 patients, and “the internal oxygen delivery systems built in many older hospitals are being overwhelmed by the volume of oxygen flow needed to treat patients with respiratory problems resulting from COVID -19. ”
Specialists in the design and construction of the US Army Corps of Engineers have been deployed to the Los Angeles area to “evaluate and, when necessary, update oxygen delivery systems” in about half a dozen hospitals.
“The hospitals we visited are already doing an incredible job,” said Col. Julie Balten, commander of the Los Angeles District for the Corps of Engineers.
But the volume of patients has been impressive.
“We entered a hospital (Mission Community Hospital in Panorama City), and they converted their administrative offices into treatment areas for COVID-19 patients,” said Balten.
On an entire floor, “they also treated COVID-19 patients in a renovated break room,” she said.
A difficult start for the new year
While Americans called in the new year, more than 10,000 families mourned the loss of a loved one to COVID-19.
At least 10,901 COVID-19 deaths have been reported in the last three days of 2020, according to Johns Hopkins University. That’s about 3,633 deaths a day – more than the number of lives lost during the 9/11 attacks.
In less than 11 months, COVID-19 killed more than 349,000 people in the United States. And another 115,000 Americans could die from the disease next month, according to projections from the University of Washington Institute of Health Metrics and Assessment.
Arkansas reported more than 4,300 new cases on Friday.
“This is a record for recently reported cases. We are certainly on the rise after Christmas travels and meetings, ”Arkansas Governor Asa Hutchinson tweeted. “As we enter this new year, our first resolution should be to follow the guidelines. We must all do our part. “
Texas health officials reported a record number of hospitalizations for COVID-19 across the state for the fifth consecutive day, with more than 12,400 patients.
And Georgia announced a new record of 8,769 new COVID-19 cases in the state on Friday.
Governor Brian Kemp said the Georgia World Congress Center convention center in downtown Atlanta has been transformed into a crowded hospital.
New York added nearly 16,500 new cases on Friday, just a day after reaching its highest number of cases in a day.
“In early 2021, I encourage all New Yorkers to look to their best angels and continue the practices we know to stop the spread of this virus – wash your hands, distance yourself socially and wear a mask,” said Governor Andrew Cuomo in a statement.
Fauci: USA will continue giving vaccine doses weeks apart
Across the country, COVID-19 vaccinations are taking place at a slower pace than expected.
More than 12.4 million doses of vaccines have been distributed across the country and more than 2.7 million doses have been administered, according to data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in the United States.
So far, vaccines approved in the United States require two doses every few weeks. And the United States will continue to do so, rather than continuing to do so and will not follow the UK’s decision to potentially delay second doses, Fauci told CNN on Friday.
“I would not be in favor of that,” said Fauci when asked about the UK’s new dosing regimen. “We will continue to do what we are doing”.
Earlier this week, British officials said that “the UK will prioritize the administration of the first dose of the vaccine to people in the highest risk group” and allow the second dose to be administered up to 12 weeks later.
The United Kingdom has adopted this strategy in order to give the first dose to as many people as possible as quickly as possible, saying that it offers some protection.
“The fact is, we want to follow what science tells us and the data we have for both [vaccines] indicate that you give a prime, followed by a boost in 21 days with Pfizer and 28 days with Moderna. And now, this is how we are going and that is the decision that is made ”, said Fauci.
“We make decisions based on data. We have no data on giving a single dose and waiting longer than the normal period of time ”to give the second dose, he added.
The-CNN-Wire ™ and © 2020 Cable News Network, Inc., a Time Warner company. All rights reserved.