COVID-19: How did Wisconsin become a hot spot? Yahoo News Explains
As a majority of states are seeing a rise in new coronavirus infections, Wisconsin Gov. Tony Evers has declared a new public health emergency for the Badger State. Over the past four weeks Wisconsin has seen a troubling spike in COVID-19 cases, with record-high daily reported cases that continue to rise. Yahoo News Medical Contributor Dr. Kavita Patel explains the reasons behind the sudden surge — and what can be done to curb it.
Video Transcript
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KAVITA PATEL: The current state of COVID-19, 41 states in the United States are now reporting higher numbers than ever before in the past four weeks, like Wisconsin, for example, where hospitalizations are at a critical level.
- Tonight, a dangerous situation is close to getting out of control in Wisconsin.
- Only 16% of the state's 11,452 hospital beds are available as of yesterday afternoon.
- The daily number of newly reported cases Thursday surpasses 3,000 for the first time.
- Wisconsin is a state in crisis right now. You don't need me to explain the numbers. You can just see it.
- The situation in Wisconsin, the best way of describing it, it's awful.
KAVITA PATEL: There are several reasons we are seeing an uptick in cases now. And unfortunately, Wisconsin has just been a victim of bad circumstances all falling at the same time.
Number one, major colleges and universities in Wisconsin opened up their doors for in-person learning, or at least, some sort of hybrid learning, creating an influx of people. And that created hundreds of cases that are documented on university campuses.
Number two, there has been an uneven approach to some of the prevention measures in the state of Wisconsin. There have been calls for a mask mandate. There have been court challenges to mask mandates. And if there's one thing we've learned about COVID-19, it's that masks do help in the prevention of the coronavirus.
The third has also been the fact that Wisconsin, with the exception of a couple of cities, is a primarily rural area. And what we've seen in states like Wisconsin, rural health care has been particularly challenged with COVID-19.
When you do have a rural hospital, they do not have the infectious disease or pulmonary critical care experts to manage these patients. So they are forced, in some cases, to try to send patients to larger urban centers, which themselves are also at capacity.
Now that we're in a true kind of hotspot moment for the state of Wisconsin, there are a couple of things that can be done, but none of them are going to work overnight. Number one, we have to roll back any in-person gatherings and dramatically restrict the ability to congregate, like in a house of worship, in a school, or in a restaurant or bar. That's number one.
Number two, there should be no question that masks work. I understand there is a resistance to a mask mandate, but that really is what needs to happen. There needs to be an emphasis for all ages and all people to wear masks, even when outdoors.
Number three, there has to be a better testing capacity. Parts of Wisconsin are still reporting a day's delay in testing results. And that only creates more chaos because people don't know if they're positive. And they are not sure if they need to isolate, which we've already learned is hard for people to do at home.
So those are three essential things that should be done to help make sure that the numbers of cases can drop dramatically. But again, it will take time, and it won't happen overnight.
