Two issues are undoubtedly true in Washington, D.C.: 1. Many people are fearful of the omicron wave, and a couple of. There are not almost sufficient COVID checks to meet the demand. This mixture has created a downside which will find yourself having lethal penalties: Emergency Rooms filled with sufferers who’re there solely to get a COVID test.
According to the Washington Post, D.C. space hospitals are begging the public to cease. “Do not come to the hospital looking to get tested,” a spokesman for the University of Maryland Charles Regional Medical Center advised the Post. The spokesperson stated that the hospital at present has wait instances so long as eight hours due to people who “frankly don’t need to be there.”
Hospitals in Northern Virginia are additionally feeling the pressure, main Virginia Department of Health and the Virginia Hospital and Healthcare Association to situation a joint assertion on Thursday urging “individuals with mild coronavirus cases” to “avoid trips to hospital emergency departments.”
According to the assertion, “Hospitals across Virginia have recently experienced an influx of patients seeking emergency department care for asymptomatic or relatively mild COVID-19 infections.” According to the assertion, “a hospital emergency department is not the appropriate venue for patients with mild to moderate COVID-19 symptoms to seek medical care. Most individuals who contract COVID-19 do not need to visit the hospital’s emergency department and can effectively recover from their illness at home, or by seeking primary care treatment and/or speaking with their primary care provider[.]”
The assertion additional signifies that the downside of people searching for hospital care for “mild to moderate” COVID signs, or “simply for the purpose of having a COVID-19 test administered” is impacting hospitals’ skill to care for really sick COVID sufferers. The assertion additional calls for people to be vaccinated in opposition to COVID-19 if they’re not already, in order to forestall extra critical signs if they’re contaminated.
In addition to total panic about the unfold of the Omicron variant and a nationwide shortage of commercially-available COVID checks, hospitals are additionally seeing people who’re presenting to emergency rooms for checks due to one more reason: authorities mandates that require a damaging test for people to return to work on January third. With many different testing areas fully out of checks at current, some see the hospital ER as the solely possibility. The downside has particularly been exacerbated by a D.C. order issued earlier this week requiring all college college students to produce a damaging test prior to returning to courses in 2022.
D.C. officers have reached out to the Biden administration begging for testing assist throughout the disaster. “There is an acute need for testing in D.C.,” one unnamed official advised the Post.
The Biden administration has responded with a proposal of assist, in accordance to the Post’s report, however the assist in query could also be woefully insufficient. According to the Post’s report, a forthcoming federal testing website could have the capability to test about 500 people per day, which can do little to meet current demand for checks.
