PEORIA, Ill. – Local health officials are saying that the wave of new COVID-19 cases are more than a wave — they are, in their words, a “tsunami.”
The average daily number of new COVID-19 cases in the Tri-Counties is at an all-time high of 682, up more than one hundred from the past week — something they’ve “never, ever” seen before.
And you’ve heard it before, but that’s a major stressor for the local hospital system.
“This is the worst that I’ve ever seen it, since of March of 2020 when we started this,” said Bob Anderson, President of OSF HealthCare St. Francis Medical Center.
Anderson says he’s traded concerns at the beginning of the pandemic about whether or not there would be enough ventilators and PPE’s, to whether there would be enough staff.
UnityPoint in Peoria is saying part of the problem is that they have sick staff, and not enough people to staff the entire hospital all the time.
This region has 11 percent of hospital beds available based on state statistics. But UnityPoint Health Central Illinois CEO Doctor Keith Knepp says, wait a minute.
“That may be the number of beds that are available, but we don’t have those beds staffed,” said Dr. Keith Knepp, UnityPoint Health Central Illinois CEO.
In other words, Knepp says he’d have to find more staff to take care of those patients, and right now, there is no one — not even travel nurses.
The vast majority of the cases remain among the unvaccinated. Anderson says there are some patients considered vaccinated that are in the ICU, but he describes it as a very small percentage.
Tri-County cases surged by 4,777 in the last week, to 73,396. 36,995 are from Peoria County, 28,402 are in Tazewell County, and 7,999 are in Woodford County.
32 deaths were reported in the last week, totaling 959. 469 are in Peoria County, 376 in Tazewell County, and 114 in Woodford County.
5,130 cases are in home isolation. 48 cases are in local ICU beds, while 198 are in non-ICU beds.
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