Volusia hospitals report record number of COVID-19 patients

VOLUSIA COUNTY, FL – Volusia County hospital systems say they are now setting records for the entire coronavirus pandemic. As of Wednesday, the positivity rate in the county was 16.6%.

Halifax Health said COVID-19-related hospitalizations had more than doubled in the past week and doctors expect the numbers to stay high until early August.

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“We don’t get a lot of responses on, ‘Oh, I just traveled across the country. “There are a lot of gatherings here, so summer vacation, socializing, July 4th, a combination of all of those things,” said Margaret Crossman, chief medical officer for Halifax Health.

She said the highly contagious delta variant could also be the cause of the spike.

Crossman said the hospital broke its previous record of 52 patients on Jan. 18 with 57 patients.

She said they weren’t worried about running out of space at the moment. When it comes to personal protective equipment, she told Halifax, they are stocked with supplies, but she said staffing was always a challenge.

“My biggest concern is that we will see more preventable cases, including serious illness and death,” she said.

Halifax said it had 72 COVID-19 hospital patients on Wednesday, including 23 in intensive care and 11 on ventilators. Of these 72, eight were fully immunized and one was on a ventilator.

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AdventHealth executives said they have seen a more than 60% increase in hospitalizations over the past five days at its central Florida hospitals.

The two health systems have pointed out that 90 to 95% of patients are not vaccinated.

“Right now, the younger age groups are the age groups that we really want to focus on,” said Ethan Johnson of the Volusia County Department of Health.

Johnson said that right now 53% of all residents are vaccinated. He said the ministry was asking local businesses to help get more involved.

“We continue to work with private businesses, churches, municipalities and community organizations to deliver COVID vaccines to where people are,” he said.