A sharp rise in COVID-19 cases and hospitalizations in the Tri-County area is threatening to overburden the region’s health care system.
Peoria City/County Health Department Administrator Monica Hendrickson said Thursday the area’s daily average for new cases over the last week is 304, more than double the previous week’s average. Peoria-area hospitals currently have 162 beds occupied by COVID patients, including 34 in intensive care units.
“This marks the highest number of hospitalizations our hospitals have seen since this pandemic began,” said Hendrickson. “We are now averaging 33 ICU beds daily, and 94 non-ICU beds daily.
“This is not sustainable. If we continue on this path, closures will be the least of the worries for this community. More pressing will be increased mortality, or deaths, further health complications, and the overwhelming of our health care system.”
Five new fatalities since Wednesday increased the region’s death toll to 181 since the start of the pandemic. The area’s total number of infections stands at 11,779, with 2,127 added in the past week after an increase of 1,237 in the previous week.
OSF Healthcare President Bob Anderson and Dr. Keith Knepp, regional president and CEO for UnityPoint Health, both spoke at Thursday’s weekly media briefing, expressing gratitude for frontline workers as the pandemic strains the system.
“This feels like the spring all over again, when we felt the urgency and the challenges of a new pandemic,” said Knepp. “You know what’s different this time? We’re a lot more prepared.
“We have tools. We have PPE (personal protective equipment). We can test a lot more people. We know more about this disease, even though we don’t have a cure. What’s different this time is the numbers are so large.”
Knepp and Anderson stressed that although the hospitals are seeing three-to-four times as many COVID-19 patients as they did at the outset of the pandemic, the hospitals are still fully prepared to handle the situation.
“But we need the community to do its part as well,” said Anderson. “We’re getting ready to enter into a long winter season, and we’re all tired. We’re tired of the pandemic. We’re tired of masking, but we can’t give in to pandemic fatigue. We must continue to follow the three W’s: remember to wear your mask, wash your hands, and watch your distance.”
COVID-19 in Tri-County
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