First, sudden increases in covid-19 infections led to a shortage of beds and hospital staff. Now there is a shortage of oxygen

(CNN) – Hospitals in parts of the southern United States are running out of oxygen supply as COVID-19 cases and hospitalizations continue to rise, driven by swaths of people who remain unvaccinated and a dangerous variant of the coronavirus that has infected millions of Americans.

Several hospitals in Florida, South Carolina, Texas and Louisiana are battling oxygen shortages. Some are at risk of having to use their reserve supply or running out of oxygen imminently, according to state health officials and hospital consultants.

With the continued rise in COVID-19 cases, there has been an increased demand on oxygen supplies and hospitals cannot keep up to meet those needs, Donna Cross, senior director of facilities and construction at Premier – a company from improving health care performance, ”he told CNN.

“Typically, an oxygen tank would be 90% full and suppliers would let them reach a recharge level of the 30-40% remaining in their tank, giving them a three to five day supply buffer,” he said. Cross. “What is happening now is that hospitals are running out at about 10-20%, which is a supply available for a day or two, before they are restocked.”

Even when refilled, it’s only a partial supply of about 50%, Cross said. “It is a very critical situation.”

Florida had the highest covid-19 hospitalization rate in the country on Saturday, with 75 patients per 100,000 hospital residents with the virus, according to data from federal health officials and Johns Hopkins University. It also hit another pandemic peak for covid-19 cases on Friday, reporting 690.5 new cases per 100,000 people each day from August 20 to August 26, as state data showed.

Portable Morgues for Central Florida

Deaths from covid-19 have risen so much that the Central Florida Disaster Medical Coalition, a federally funded nonprofit that helps prepare the health care system response, has purchased 14 portable morgues with capacity for 12 each dead, said Coalition Executive Director Lynne Drawdy.

He said the organization has met with hospitals in the region to find out what their needs are. Hospitals reported that in the last week more space in the morgue was the top priority because there was not adequate capacity, and that they have seen delays in funeral homes that pick up the deceased.

Dr. Ahmed Elhaddad, an intensive care unit physician in Florida, told CNN’s Pamela Brown on Saturday that he is frustrated and “tired of seeing people die and suffer because they didn’t get vaccinated.”

He said the delta variant is “eating” people’s lungs, eventually leading to their collapse.

“We’re seeing patients die faster with this (delta) variant,” said Elhaddad, who is the medical director of the ICU at Jupiter Medical Center.

“This time we are seeing younger patients (30, 40, 50 years old) and they are suffering. They are starving for oxygen and they are dying. Unfortunately, this time they are dying faster,” he said.

The government’s top infectious disease expert, Dr. Anthony Fauci, told CNN’s Jake Tapper that the United States could see an additional 100,000 deaths from covid-19 by December, as predicted by a model from the University of Washington.

“What is happening now is completely predictable, but completely preventable. And you know we know we have the means with vaccines to reverse this,” said Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases.

Elhaddad noted that his ICU does not have a single Covid-19 patient who is vaccinated, nor did he see any vaccinated person die from Covid-19.

“There is no magic medicine … the only thing we are finding is that the vaccine prevents death. It prevents patients from going to the ICU,” Elhaddad said.

Fauci pointed to the 80 million Americans who are eligible for the vaccine, but are not vaccinated. “We could reverse this and we could do it efficiently and quickly if we just vaccinate those people,” he said.

Florida has fully vaccinated 52.4% of its total population, as shown by data from the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Saturday.

Meanwhile, less than 50% of people in South Carolina, Louisiana and Texas, where oxygen supplies are also low, are fully vaccinated. Studies have shown that full vaccination is necessary for optimal protection against the delta variant.

Nationwide, 52.1% of the population was fully vaccinated as of Saturday, according to data from the CDC.

Hurricane Ida targets Louisiana as COVID-19 hospitalizations remain high

Louisiana’s overall vaccination rate remains one of the lowest in the country at 41.2%, and state hospitals are treating hundreds of COVID-19 patients as Hurricane Ida hits the region.

Some 2,450 people were hospitalized with COVID-19 in Louisiana, Gov. John Bel Edwards said Saturday, representing a 20% drop in the past 10 days. But it is still the most the state has had since before the current surge in cases, Edwards told CNN’s Jim Acosta.

More than 475 of those patients use ventilators, according to data from the state Department of Health.

Hurricane Ida made landfall near Port Fourchon, Louisiana, on Sunday as a dangerous Category 4 hurricane. Potential injuries from the storm may compound the risk of health care facilities being overwhelmed, given COVID patients -19 already occupy hospitals at high rates.

“Hospital evacuation will not be possible because there is nowhere to take those patients, there is no excess capacity anywhere else in the state or out of state,” Edwards said.

“So there are people who can be injured as a result of the hurricane itself, so we have to make sure we have some capacity for them,” he said. “We still have a very, very challenging situation here throughout the state of Louisiana.”

Edwards said he is concerned about prolonged power outages. The state has about 10,000 line workers ready to start and another 20,000 on standby to help as soon as needed.

“Restoring power will be vitally important to keep these hospitals running,” he said.

All parishes in the state are in the highest risk category for coronavirus, with widespread and uncontrolled transmission and many undetected cases, the state health department said.

“We are heading into a really difficult time for young people,” says doctor

A return to in-person learning has led to thousands of students having to self-quarantine in the United States, with COVID-19 cases among children rising to levels not seen since the winter.

And children’s hospitalizations due to COVID-19 could continue to rise as more of them return to classrooms this fall.

“There is no question that we are heading into a really difficult time for young people,” Dr. Esther Choo told CNN’s Wolf Blitzer on Saturday.

Choo, a professor of emergency medicine at Oregon Health and Science University, added that while last year people were reassured that the virus would not affect children as badly, this year is different.

“We will go back to school in person, unmasked across the United States. There is a lot of resistance to things like mask mandates and vaccines that would keep our children safer in schools,” he said.

In particular, children under the age of 12 are not yet eligible to get vaccinated against COVID-19.

Not all schools in the United States have opened yet, but the remaining schools are expected to open after Labor Day, which is when Choo said children’s hospitalizations from Covid-19 could increase.

“We are certainly going to see more than what we are seeing now, which are hospitals full of pediatric admissions,” he said, noting that child deaths from COVID-19 will also become more common.

Fauci said he supports the obligation of covid-19 vaccines for students who are eligible, noting: “This is not something new. We have mandates in many places in schools, particularly in public schools, that they do indeed want us to Among a child, I have done it for decades and decades requiring vaccinations against polio, measles, mumps, rubella, hepatitis. “

– CNN’s Kristen Holmes, Amanda Watts, Rebekah Riess, Lauren Mascarenhas, Taylor Romine, Elizabeth Joseph, and Claire Colbert contributed to this report.