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Aug 29 – The stress of healthcare providers over the delta variant of COVID-19 is prompting doctors to refocus the vaccine debate on protecting and supporting healthcare workers.
In the aftermath of an unprecedented joint press conference with leaders of Maine’s largest healthcare networks, state health officials reported on Friday that 143 people had been hospitalized with coronavirus, a number that exceeds the counts reported during the spring outbreak.
“We have reached a critical moment in the pandemic, where what the Mainers do in the future will determine what happens next,” Dr James Jarvis said at the press conference Thursday.
Chief Medical Directors of MaineHealth, MaineGeneral Health and Central Maine Healthcare joined Jarvis, COVID-19 Incident Commander at Northern Light Health, to publicly voice their concerns.
The number of people treated for COVID-19 in intensive care units in Maine on Friday was 71, which tied the all-time record on January 20, when there were 71 people in intensive care units .
Friday’s intensive care count was an increase of 12 from Thursday, and there were 31 people on ventilators.
The main difference between now and the end of January concerns vaccines. The vaccine rollout was still in its early stages and only a fraction of Maine’s population was eligible to receive vaccines.
Eight months later, 71% of eligible Mainers are fully immunized and 80% have received at least one injection.
The delta variant accounts for nearly 100% of all new cases, according to a genome sequencing report from the Maine Center for Disease Control & Prevention.
The delta variant poses a particularly acute threat to unvaccinated people, who constitute the overwhelming majority of new cases and current hospitalizations.
And 18 months after the start of the pandemic, healthcare systems and providers are being pushed to a tipping point.
While there are justified fears that the October 1 deadline for healthcare workers to be fully immunized is weighing on healthcare networks, Dr Joan Boomsma of MaineHealth said they would not lose any providers during the mandate.
“With the very high rates of community transmission right now in Maine, part of our shortages is that we are losing staff because they are infected with COVID,” Boomsma said. “Right now we’re losing them because of the virus, not the vaccine. “
State health officials on Friday reported 267 new cases of COVID-19 statewide, including 15 in Androscoggin County, eight in Franklin County and 12 in Oxford County.
The seven-day moving average of new daily cases was 1.02 per 10,000 people in Androscoggin County, 1.82 in Franklin County, 1.36 in Oxford County and 1.61 statewide.
Dr Joe Anderson, a hospital pediatrician at Central Maine Medical Center in Lewiston, said he doesn’t necessarily have a strong opinion on the mandate, but worries about how the healthcare system is doing. would come out without the protective layer provided by vaccines.
“I think my point of view is really to do the best thing for our patients, and for that, I think, is number one, by getting vaccinated,” Anderson said.
“I know if I came in contact with COVID I would be less likely to get it and pass it on to someone else. And the other part of that is a little (of) maintaining the strength of our health care system, ”he said.
Anderson expressed concern about what is happening in the South, where vaccination rates are low and infection rates high.
“Hospitals are completely overwhelmed and unable to provide good medical care because there have been so many patients admitted with COVID that they cannot treat patients who come in with trauma or heart attacks or whatever. another who would take them to the hospital, ”he said. noted.
This concern was at the heart of the network leaders’ calls to the Mainers to get vaccinated.
Even when hospitals have the capacity to add beds, “you’re going to steal from Peter to pay Paul,” said Dr. Steven Diaz of MaineGeneral Health, because there isn’t the staff needed for that.
“The solution has to be a public health measure to make everything safer so that we can reduce the numbers and provide health care appropriately,” Diaz said.
The Maine Department of Health and Human Services has the power to require the COVID-19 vaccine under a rule that dates back 20 years. It says staff at all designated health facilities should be vaccinated against certain infectious diseases, such as measles, rubella and chickenpox.
While this rule has been around for some time, David Salko, a family medicine specialist at Topsham and regional director of primary care for Central Maine Healthcare, said he can understand why some providers have reacted negatively to the addition of the COVID vaccine. -19.
“I think we take the choice of being in health care and we dedicate our lives and our abilities in one way or another to caring for others,” said Salko. And there are pre-pandemic risks that come with being in this field.
“Because these things have been suppressed by vaccination and have been in place for some time, they are more commonly accepted,” he said. “This is new information.”
With the deadline, Salko said he can understand why some people feel like this is an ultimatum.
“But we make choices without 100% of the information,” he said all the time. And in this case, although the vaccines themselves are new and there are no studies spanning years yet, “the problem with advancements is that what we are doing now occurs much faster “.
Add to that the fact that as a global pandemic, “this is a real human effort by every country and every scientific community to try to work and develop a solution.”
Salko said it’s important to put this conversation in the context of everyday medicine. Providers ask their patients to take “invasive and potentially dangerous” measures, from x-rays to surgery.
“This is something we ask everyone to do to help prevent further illnesses in our community members, our families, our friends, our loved ones, even people we don’t know.”
No vaccine is 100% effective or safe, but complications from the COVID vaccine are rare, Salko said.
On the other hand, contracting COVID poses a much higher risk to an individual and those around them, as evidenced by the current increase and stress in the healthcare system, public health officials have said.
Faced with this decision to get the vaccine, Anderson of CMMC said one of the best sources is a person’s primary care doctor.
These doctors know their patients’ medical history and can talk to them about their concerns.
“Plus, they have a relationship with them so they can help allay those fears in a more personalized way than just reading about it or watching someone on TV telling you (that) you should. get vaccinated, ”Anderson said.
“You should be able to have this personal conversation and talk about it with your doctor,” he said.
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