Morning Briefing
Summaries of health policy coverage from major news organizations
More Hospital Systems In Crisis With Rationed Care, Disrupted Transfers
Anchorage Daily News: Alaska Health Workers Face Anger And Threats From COVID Patients And Public, Chief Medical Officer Says
The new numbers come a day after state officials announced they would implement crisis standards of care statewide, a worst-case scenario that forces hospitals to ration care due to resource and staffing limitations. Those limitations and continually high numbers of COVID-19 patients have overwhelmed health care facilities around the state. At least one rural cardiac patient died recently when a bed in Anchorage wasn’t available. (Berman and Krakow, 9/24)
The Guardian: ‘It’s Awful. It’s Exhausting’: Alaska Rations Care As It Hits Covid Nadir
Alaska now has the highest rate of Covid in America. On Wednesday the state hit its record number of cases and hospitalizations in the entire pandemic, and the numbers continue rising as its rolling seven-day average of daily cases tops 800. For Dr Anne Zink, Alaska’s chief medical officer and a practicing ER physician, this is the worst part of the pandemic. “It’s awful. It’s exhausting,” she told the Guardian. “We went in this to care for patients, and it’s heartbreaking to not be able to give the care that you know could potentially save their life.” And, she said, it’s only going to get worse. (Schreiber, 9/24)
AP: Beshear: Hospitals Can't Sustain Current COVID Case Levels
While Kentucky’s prolonged surge of COVID-19 cases has shown signs of leveling off, overstressed hospitals can’t sustain the current pace of seriously ill virus patients, Gov. Andy Beshear said Thursday as he pleaded with people to take preventive steps. The governor — who had much of his pandemic-fighting authority taken away by lawmakers — stressed that the more Kentuckians who get vaccinated and wear masks when indoors in public, the “faster we can get this thing on the way down.” (Schreiner, 9/23)
AP: Restarted Nebraska Hospital Transfer System Sees Complaints
Health care officials are lodging complaints about a reopened transfer center intended to help Nebraska hospitals find places to send patients who need additional care as COVID-19 cases have surged in recent weeks. Officials at Lincoln’s Bryan Health and at smaller hospitals around the state have complained that the transfer center has not proven helpful in recent cases where very sick patients need to get to a larger hospital, the Lincoln Journal Star reported. In some cases, hospital staff reported they got no help from the system and, instead, had to make numerous calls themselves to find an intensive care bed. (9/23)
AP: Arizona Nurse Shortage Sidelines Non-COVID Patient Transfers
An ongoing nursing shortage in Arizona will likely keep non-COVID-19 patients from quickly getting transferred to more equipped hospitals. State health officials this week rejected a request to expand the state “surge line,” a call-in system to find beds for critically ill COVID-19 patients, to include people with other medical needs, the Arizona Daily Star reported. (9/23)
In other news about the spread of the coronavirus —
AP: Alabama Leading US In COVID-19 Death Rate Over Last Week
Alabama has averaged more than 100 deaths a day from COVID-19 over the last week, statistics showed Thursday, giving it the nation’s highest death rate over the period even as hospitalizations linked to the coronavirus pandemic continue to decline. Statistics from Johns Hopkins University show 106 deaths were reported statewide daily over the last seven days, although some of those could have occurred earlier because of a lag in reporting. Alabama’s rate of 18 deaths for every 100,000 people over the last week is far above second-place West Virginia, which had 10 deaths per 100,000 people, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. (9/23)
AP: COVID-19 Toll In WVa Eclipses Worst US Coal Mine Disaster
Gov. Jim Justice compared the skyrocketing number of coronavirus deaths in West Virginia to some of the state’s worst coal mining disasters, asking why the daily tolls don’t motivate more people to get their COVID-19 shots. This month’s virus deaths have surpassed the total from the worst coal mining disaster in U.S. history and is on pace to eclipse the previous four months of the pandemic combined. The 25 deaths reported Thursday pushed the September total to at least 408 with a week still left, according to state health data. (Raby, 9/23)
Axios: Colorado Now Offering Free At-Home COVID-19 Rapid Tests
Colorado is spending $16 million to purchase 2 million rapid COVID-19 tests and plans to start sending them to residents for free starting this week. The new effort is designed to curb the spread of the Delta variant amid a fifth wave of infections that is threatening hospital bed capacity in some areas of the state. (Frank, 9/23)
AP: Fond Du Lac Officer, 26, Dies Of Coronavirus Complications
A 26-year-old Fond du Lac police officer died of complications from COVID-19, his department said Thursday. Officer Joseph Kurer’s death on Wednesday came a day after his second child was born, according to police Chief Aaron Goldstein. Because evidence indicates he contracted COVID-19 while working, he died in the line of duty and his death will be treated as such, Goldstein said. (9/23)
And in covid research —
KHN: A Daily Pill To Treat Covid Could Be Just Months Away, Scientists Say
Within a day of testing positive for covid-19 in June, Miranda Kelly was sick enough to be scared. At 44, with diabetes and high blood pressure, Kelly, a certified nursing assistant, was having trouble breathing, symptoms serious enough to send her to the emergency room. When her husband, Joe, 46, fell ill with the virus, too, she really got worried, especially about their five teenagers at home: “I thought, ‘I hope to God we don’t wind up on ventilators. We have children. Who’s going to raise these kids?” (Aleccia, 9/24)
CIDRAP: COVID-Related Syndrome In Adults Severe, Hard To Diagnose, Study Finds
Multisystem inflammatory syndrome in adults (MIS-A) is a rare but severe hyperinflammatory condition that begins roughly 4 weeks after COVID-19 symptom onset and likely results from an outsized immune response, concludes a systematic review yesterday in JAMA Network Open. Researchers from the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention conducted a literature review from May 1, 2020, to May 25, 2021, identifying 221 patients around the world diagnosed as having MIS-A. First identified in children (MIS-C) in April 2020, the syndrome has since also been recognized in adults. (9/23)
