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Arizona has become ‘hottest hotspot’ for COVID-19 as state experiences world’s highest case rates and records hospitalizations – and health officials warn numbers won’t that get worse because of the holiday gatherings.
Arizona reported 9,909 new cases of COVID-19 and 297 new deaths on Thursday, the highest total in a single day to date, although the state health department Noted most were due to the “death certificate matching process”.
Arizona has the worst rates of COVID-19 cases in the world, according to 91-divoc.com, a COVID-19 tracker. The state currently has the highest seven-day average of COVID-19 infections per capita of any region in the world, according to data from Johns Hopkins University.
Arizona also leads the country in hospitalization rates, according to the COVID Tracking Project. There were 4,920 hospitalizations reported Thursday – the highest number for the fourth day in a row.
Staffing issues
Statewide, 7% of intensive care unit beds were available as of Wednesday, according to data from the Arizona Department of Health Services.
Banner Health cares for about half of all COVID-19 patients in Arizona, officials said. The situation in the state is “beyond concern,” Dr Marjorie Bessel, clinical director of the hospital system, said during a press briefing on Wednesday.
“Arizona state hospitals are currently very stretched despite considerable preparation and efforts to increase capacity,” Bessel said.
Banner Health canceled elective surgeries at all of its Arizona hospitals on January 1. Its occupancy rate in Arizona is above 100% of its licensed bed capacity, Bessel said on Wednesday, although staffing is the system’s biggest concern.
“We can create beds, we believe,” she says. “It’s the trained staff, this expert nurse, this wonderful doctor, this amazingly diligent respiratory therapist, these are the people who are really, really thin right now. And there aren’t many more across the country because they are deployed in every state trying to meet the demands of every community. “
Bessel predicts that hospitalizations will only worsen in the coming weeks due to the “cumulative effect of Thanksgiving, Christmas and New Year’s Eve activities.”
Wait times are another concern, as hospitals may have to keep patients in emergency rooms because there are no intensive care or inpatient beds available.
“The wait can range from a few hours to over 24 to 48 hours in the emergency department until we are able to move someone from the emergency department to a hospital bed,” Dr Michael White , clinical director of Valleywise Health in Maricopa County, said Wednesday at a press briefing.
Calls for mitigation – and app
As Arizona has emerged as the “hottest hotspot for COVID,” Bessel urges residents to “narrow their circle” to those in their household, wear a mask with people outside their circle and “stop to attend unmasked gatherings even if you are feeling well. “
“It is very likely that someone at these gatherings is carrying the virus, and they are passing it on to you,” she said, noting that contract tracing is not beneficial because COVID-19 ” is so out of control in our state. “
“We need each of you to do your part so that hospitals can remain open and accessible to all who need health care,” she added.
The health official also called for increased mitigation measures, such as a statewide mask warrant, a curfew and cessation of indoor meals, and the application of existing measures.
The state did not issue a mask warrant, although several cities and counties did. The citations for failing to meet mask orders have not been issued in Tucson, Flagstaff or the 12 largest cities in the Phoenix area, according to a recent investigation by the Republic of Arizona.
Governor Doug Ducey also called on local governments to implement the measures.
“There are steps in place, and if a lot of these leaders who are reaching out and asking for further action really wanted to apply and be responsible around the steps that are already there, we can further reduce the spread of this and save lives, “Ducey said at a press briefing last month.
In a Jan. 3 report obtained by ABC News, the White House Coronavirus Task Force said Arizona’s post-holiday figures “raised significant concerns” about the community spread of COVID-19, and recommended a “combination of aggressive mitigation with additional and substantial restrictions. acceleration of vaccinations.”
The Republican governor has not tightened restrictions despite calls to do so.
“Faced with strict mitigation measures in place and states with little or no mitigation in place are all going through the same thing,” Ducey spokesman CJ Karamargin told The Associated Press this week. “The mitigation measures that the state of Arizona put in place early on – they remain in place. We urge every Arizonian to follow them.
Focus on vaccinations
The state has prioritized vaccination to fight the pandemic.
“The vaccine will save millions of lives in the future, and that’s our goal today,” Ducey said last month.
More than 113,000 people as of Thursday, including frontline medical workers, residents and nursing home staff, were vaccinated in Arizona, according to the state health department.
The goal is to get some 3.5 million people vaccinated, officials said.
Staffing is a concern at vaccination sites, Bessel said. Banner Health operates three vaccination sites statewide, requiring hundreds of staff and volunteers every day. Bessel herself has been repeatedly redeployed to Banner Health’s vaccination pod at the Arizona State Fairgrounds to administer vaccines, a spokesperson told ABC News.
“We strive as much as possible because we believe that [the] the vaccine is the way out of the pandemic, ”she said.
Arizona National Guard-trained volunteers began administering the COVID-19 vaccine on Wednesday and supporting vaccination sites in Arizona, officials said. They include retired health professionals and people with medical training.
“When people saw us here they wanted to volunteer, which is exactly what we needed,” U.S. Army Col. Tom Leaper, the Arizona National Guard surgeon, told Arizona State Guard surgeon. KNXV, Affiliate of Phoenix ABC. “We were contacted by a group of volunteers who said they wanted to help protect their state and their communities, and what can they do to help.”
For now, it is “critically important” that people continue to socially distance themselves, White said.
“Even if the vaccine begins to be distributed in our community, it will be months before we are able to reduce our restrictions,” he said. “If we don’t continue to do this, we risk overwhelming our clinical departments and our hospitals.”
Josh Margolin, Brian Hartman and Eric Strauss of ABC News contributed to this report.
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