(CNN) – Louisiana hospitals, already overwhelmed by the increase in COVID-19 cases, are now faced with the need to continue operating after the significant damage and disruption caused by Hurricane Ida.
“For me, it’s like a hit in the stomach,” said Dr. Mark Kline, chief physician at Children’s Hospital of New Orleans. “The point is that the same doctors who have been here for more than 24 hours working non-stop during the hurricane are the ones who have been the most stressed caring for children with covid in the last two months.”
Hospitals and medical centers have reported debris and water leaks, others are working with borrowed generators and some are having to consider transporting patients to hospitals in other states.
“We already have the Corps of Engineers on the ground, identifying additional generators that we can bring to these hospital locations so that in the event of a failure before power is restored, we can change them, and they are working very hard on it. “Governor John Bel Edwards told President Joe Biden during a briefing on the hurricane Monday afternoon.
Ida left more than a million people without power when it made landfall on Sunday. At least two deaths have been reported from the storm.
The state health system was already on edge due to the increase in covid cases. Louisiana’s intensive care units are 88% full and nearly half (45%) of those beds are occupied by COVID-19 patients, according to data from the US Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). for its acronym in English), which causes the state to face two major crises at the same time.
“I have to keep reminding people that, like it or not, we are still in the covid environment. It is a very difficult covid environment, in which 100% of our current cases are attributable to the delta variant,” Edwards said, referring to the most transmissible variant of the coronavirus, which represents the vast majority of new cases diagnosed in the United States.
The state already has the seventh highest COVID-19 hospitalization rate in the country, according to HHS data. About three-quarters of all hospital beds are currently occupied, and more than one in six patients have COVID-19, according to the data.
Here’s how hospitals are handling the double deluge of chaos:
Some hospitals have already evacuated patients
Ochsner Health System, Louisiana’s largest nonprofit university health system, is evacuating about 165 patients from facilities that were damaged in the storm.
Warner Thomas, the company’s president and CEO, said Monday that 65 of those patients were from St. Anne in Raceland and the Leonard J. Chabert Medical Center in Houma.
Another 100 patients will be transferred from the partner Terrebonne Behavioral Health Center in Houma. Patients are being transported to multiple facilities across the state, including St. Bernard Parish Hospital, he said.
In Galliano, Louisiana, all patients at Lady of the Sea General Hospital were transferred to other facilities, according to Karen Collins, CEO of the medical center.
“Our staff worked tirelessly in extreme conditions to continue caring for our patients during Hurricane Ida, and thanks to their efforts, all of our patients came out of this event safe and sound,” Collins said.
Governor Edwards said another hospital, the Terrebonne General Health System, was in the process of being evacuated Monday night.
In New Orleans, Children’s Hospital has a contingency plan to move children to other facilities if necessary, Kline told CNN affiliate WDSU-TV.
“Less than 5% of hospitals in the entire United States are pediatric hospitals, so we cannot transport our sick children to just any hospital, it has to be a place that cares for very seriously ill children with complex medical problems,” he said. .
Kline said the children were safe overnight because the hospital began closing and preparing for the storm around 7 a.m. Sunday.
Some hospitals suffered serious damage
Two days before Ida made landfall, the Children’s Hospital had just inaugurated a $ 300 million expansion, Kline said.
Now, the new section has water on the ground floor, water entering through the roof and 76.2 millimeters of water in the chapel that has not been used.
“We have been on emergency backup power for more than 12 hours,” he said.
Power, clean water and staff safety are the hospital’s top three concerns, Kline said.
“Right now we don’t have a clear idea of how many of our staff have lost their homes, have seriously damaged their homes, or are in an area where they can’t get to the hospital,” Kline said. “Right now, we are all running on an empty tank.”
At Ochsner Health System, Thomas says all the facilities suffered some type of roof damage during the storm.
“It was a pretty rough ride yesterday, sustained winds, for a much longer period of time than I think people anticipated, created significant damage to our system as well as the entire region,” Thomas said.
The Ochsner Health facility continues to run on emergency backup power and, according to Thomas, has a 10-day supply of fuel. Trucks are on the way to help the hospital’s energy needs.
Lady of the Sea General Hospital had to close its emergency room and hospital after significant damage.
“Our goal is to open at least one of our Rural Health Clinics and Community Pharmacy sometime this week. We will continue to post information on health services for the South Lafourche community as it becomes available,” says a press release from the hospital.
In response to the dire situation in Louisiana, White House press secretary Jen Psaki said the federal government is monitoring the situation to ensure that hospitals are not without oxygen. He also said that HHS and the Federal Emergency Management Agency are working to assess and deploy additional assets as needed.
“Before the storm, we had more than 300 federally deployed medical personnel on the ground to support the response to the COVID surge in Louisiana and Mississippi,” Psaki said. “The Department of Veterans Affairs has made beds available in advance of the hurricane to support local hospitals and will be available to assist in the response.”
– CNN’s Joe Sutton, Jenn Selva and Jon Bonifield contributed to this report.
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