Morning Briefing
Summaries of health policy coverage from major news organizations
Rural Hospitals Flooding With COVID Cases In Fall's New Hot Spots
Stateline: COVID-19 Patients Swamp Rural Hospitals
The nation’s pandemic hotspots have shifted to rural communities, overwhelming small hospitals that are running out of beds or lack the intensive care units for more than one or two seriously ill patients. And in much of the Midwest and Great Plains, hospital workers are catching the virus at home and in their communities, seriously reducing already slim benches of doctors, nurses and other professionals needed to keep rural hospitals running. (Vestal, 10/20)
Bloomberg: A Troubling Rural Trend In America
Daily Covid-19 cases are continuing to climb as temperatures begin to dip across the U.S., students return to classrooms and more people stay indoors where the virus spreads easily. While far fewer people are ending up hospitalized with the illness than during the pandemic’s spring surge, many more deaths are expected to be added to almost 218,000 already reported nationally as cases spike, experts said. (Brown and Levin, 10/19)
Stat: New Surge Of Covid-19 Cases Has States, Hospitals Scrambling Again
Here we go again. As hospitalizations for Covid-19 inch up around the country, some states are readying plans for field hospitals. Communities are delaying reopening plans and even imposing new measures, though some governors remain opposed to additional restrictions. Deaths — currently standing about 220,000 — have not surged again yet, but that might just be a matter of time. (Joseph, 10/20)
Modern Healthcare: Nursing Homes Worry About Third Wave Of COVID-19 As U.S. Cases Rise
When nationwide case counts started climbing in late September, so too did cases in nursing homes, according to an analysis of data from CMS and Johns Hopkins by the American Health Care Association and National Center for Assisted Living. Nursing homes cases had been falling since a peak of 10,125 cases the week of July 26. Deaths were highest at the beginning of the pandemic when there were 3,222 COVID-19-related deaths in nursing homes the week of May 31; however, death data for nursing homes isn't available for the weeks prior. (Christ, 1/19)
More on the fall resurgence —
CNN: US Coronavirus: Covid-19 Cases Are Climbing In More Than Half Of US States And These Factors Helped Drive The Surge
Covid-19 numbers are once again climbing back up across the country, with more than half of US states reporting a rise in new infections in what experts say is the dreaded fall surge. And there's several factors that got the country here, one expert told CNN. Among them are college and school reopenings, Dr. Tom Inglesby, the director of the Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security, told CNN Monday night. But that's not all. (Maxouris, 10/20)
Scientific American: Debunking The False Claim That COVID Death Counts Are Inflated
A persistent falsehood has been circulating on social media: the number of COVID deaths is much lower than the official statistic of more than 218,000, and therefore the danger of the disease has been overblown. In August President Trump retweeted a post claiming that only 6 percent of these reported deaths were actually from COVID-19. (The tweet originated from a follower of the debunked conspiracy fantasy QAnon.) Twitter removed the post for containing false information, but fabrications such as these continue to spread. (Aschwanden, 10/20)
