Topline
The city of Tulsa has run out of ICU beds, health officials announced Monday night, as the latest U.S. Covid-19 spike is starting to lead to grim consequences across the country, with signs pointing to the situation only getting worse.
A medical staff member grabs the hand of a patient to reposition the bed in the Covid-19 ICU at the ... [+]
Key Facts
Tulsa Mayor G. T. Bynum said Tuesday that regional hospitals are now enacting surge plans after health officials announced that Tulsa had run out of ICU beds at 9 p.m. Monday night.
It’s also a grim situation in El Paso, Texas, where officials are requesting another four mobile morgue trailers to handle coronavirus victims, in addition to the six mobile morgues already in place because the regular morgue space can’t handle the spike in deaths.
Wisconsin, which is part of the midwestern epicenter of the latest outbreak, built a field hospital to deal with its massive hospitalization spike.
What To Watch For
The U.S. appears poised to break its record for coronavirus hospitalizations. As of Monday, 59,275 patients were suffering from coronavirus in American hospitals, just short of the record of 59,940 set on April 15, according to The Covid Tracking Project.
Big Number
Zero. There is not a single state that is trending in the right direction when it comes to Covid-19, according to covidexitstrategy.org. There are 45 states currently in a condition of “uncontrolled spread.”
Key Background
New coronavirus cases have been at record-setting levels for weeks now in the U.S., with no letup in sight. Hospitalizations have also now been spiking for more than a month. Deaths, which lag behind increases in other metrics, have also started to spike. If trends continue, the seven-day average for Covid deaths will again top 1,000 per day at some point in the coming days.
Surprising Fact
Unlike the two earlier U.S. surges, the spike this time is not largely limited to one geographic area. The Midwest may be experiencing the worst of the outbreak, but the Northeast, for example, is having its biggest Covid spike since the spring.
Tangent
President Donald Trump has repeatedly said that the U.S. is “rounding the turn” when it comes to coronavirus, a false statement that is in fact the opposite of what is actually going on. President-elect Joe Biden has acknowledged the severity of the pandemic, warning that the U.S. faces a “very dark winter.” On Monday, Biden’s transition team announced a 12-member task force (made up of former government health officials, academics and prominent figures in medicine) to advise how to best combat the pandemic in the United States.
Further Reading
No ICU beds available in Tulsa, according to EMSA (KTUL-TV)
El Paso, Texas, is asking for 4 more mobile morgues as Covid-19 deaths spike (CNN)
Wisconsin Opens A Field Hospital At State Fair Grounds As Coronavirus Cases Spike (NPR)
The Hidden Costs Of Coronavirus Hospitalizations (Forbes)
The U.S. Just Set A Record (Again) For New Coronavirus Cases (Forbes)
Covid Cases, Hospitalizations And Deaths All On The Rise For First Time Since July (Forbes)
