"The game has changed since the Delta wave. The challenges we are facing are really around staffing. Compounding that is that this is a much more infectious variant, taking more staff out that we have in the workforce." ~Chancellor of Clinical Affairs at Mississippi's largest hospital
"One of our biggest problems is just finding employees to take care of patients because we have so many employees that are out sick." ~Doctor at Vanderbilt University Medical Center
Staffing is the new crisis in American hospitals. Oregon and Maine are the latest states to request National Guard help for overwhelmed hospitals. At least 80 percent of staffed hospital beds are occupied in 24 states. At least 85 percent of ICU beds are occupied in 18 states. The states in the worst trouble in this regard are Alabama, Missouri New Mexico, Rhode Island, Texas, and Wisconsin. At least 60 children are hospitalized in Alabama, 13 in ICUs. One third of Mississippi's nurses have left for other jobs or to better paying jobs in other states. There are currently about 3,000 vacant positions.
Omicron may be starting to plateau in New York and along the east coast, where it first started. Elsewhere, though, it's still spreading, working its way across the country. The Texas department of state and health services notes, "Covid has never spread this fast." It may take a while for Omicron to traverse the country, but it surely will.
Around the world, China has shut down Anyang, a city of 5.5 million people after finding two covid cases there. That was not a typo. Two (2) cases have led China to lock down 5.5 million people. Sweden's prime minister has tested positive and is working from home. Italy has reintroduced an outdoor mask mandate. It never got rid of an indoor mask mandate even when cases dropped during the summer.The police enforcing those mandates are protesting that the office of national covid-19 emergency commission sent them pink masks. They claim the color is "eccentric" and ill-matched to their uniforms. The color risks jeopardizing the image of the institution. Finally, the British Prime Minister's office is apologizing for two separate parties held the night before Prince Philip's funeral. The parties were for people leaving positions. Number 10 Downing Street is having lots of problems with parties during the pandemic.
The Marine Corps has given its first religious exemption from a vaccine mandate in at least 10 years; in fact, it granted two, both for the covid-19 vaccine. The fact that there were 3,350 requests (3,212 have been processed) makes those two exemptions pretty special. Details of the basis for the exemptions was not given for privacy reasons.
The Professor's covid test came back negative. I can't help but wonder, though, just how many times he will need to get tested as the semester proceeds. As the supervisor (in name only) of all the department's teaching assistants, he gets notified if one of them tests positive. He got another one of those emails this morning. Fortunately, he'd had no personal contact with that student. It could be an interesting semester.
1 comment:
The phrase "political party" has taken on a whole new meaning recently. I was listening to the clink of bottles on the radio last night as the journalist explored how many bottles would fit in a small wheeled suitcase. I think they have shot themselves in the foot apologising to the palace, the image that is immediately brought to mind when you hear that is that of the Queen sat alone at the centre of a doughnut of empty pews. She followed the rules for her husband's funeral at the time when her civil servants were partying. The approach to scandal so far has been to ignore it until it goes away but I believe zombies or aliens would be the only distractions from this, the issue is so easily understood because we all have an understanding of the lockdown rules, we all had the same lived experience (except clearly we didn't).
We seem to be past the peak of omicron now, there have been so many cases that it must have caught a chunk of the 10% who are unvaccinated. One way or another we will all be getting antibodies.
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