Doctor: 'Pandemic of the unvaccinated' as COVID-19 surge overwhelms hospitals

Dec. 10—WINDBER, Pa. — Wednesday's announcement that eight of the nine hospitals in Geisinger Health System are over capacity due to COVID-19 cases struck a familiar note with local hospitals.

"I think the situation is serious — not only here, but across the state and nation," said Dr. David Csikos, chief medical officer at Chan Soon-Shiong Medical Center at Windber.

The Pennsylvania Department of Health's COVID-19 dashboard on Thursday showed there were no intensive care unit beds available at any of the six hospitals in Cambria, Blair and Bedford counties. Somerset County's three hospitals had nine ICU beds available.

Statements from Conemaugh and UPMC health systems addressed COVID-related capacity issues.

"Hospital capacity is stretched across the region," the Conemaugh statement reads.

"Inpatient beds, critical care capacity and emergency department capacity have all been impacted by rising COVID-19 cases over the past few weeks, and Conemaugh Health System has not been immune to this."

In its Altoona-Western Maryland region hospitals, UPMC is treating 153 inpatients who are positive for COVID-19, the health system's statement says.

"We've responded, but it is not easy. We are challenged every day and our dedicated teams are working very hard every day," UPMC said.

All hospitals in the local area say they are prepared to continue providing care for COVID and non-COVID patients.

"We are open and available and are committed to providing unscheduled care to our patients as effectively and efficiently as possible," UPMC said. "We will continue to care for our community and our staff will continue saving lives and delivering necessary care."

Windber is also ready to help, Csikos said.

"Most days, our emergency room is very busy, but we do have adequate staffing to care for the patients," Csikos said. "We are seeing delays in transferring patients to tertiary facilities, but that's occurring everywhere."

The surge led Windber to reactivate its intensive care unit that had been in mothballs because of staffing issues, hospitalist Dr. Craig Fockler said.

The three ICU patients at Windber would normally have been transferred to a tertiary care center, such as Conemaugh Memorial Medical Center in Johnstown or UPMC Altoona, he said.

"It's affecting the whole hospital in terms of everything," Fockler said. "We are treating patients that we would not be treating in the past because we have no place to send them."

All the hospitals link the surge to low vaccination rates.

"This is a pandemic of the unvaccinated," Csikos said, explaining that 83% to 90% of those admitted with COVID-19 have not been fully vaccinated.

At Conemaugh Memorial, about 88% of those admitted during the first week of December were not fully vaccinated.

"Being vaccinated against COVID-19 continues to be our best defense against serious illness, hospitalization and death," the Conemaugh statement said.

"As the COVID-19 virus continues to circulate in our community and the new omicron variant spreads across the country, we strongly encourage vaccination, as well as wearing masks in public indoor settings, avoiding crowded spaces, observing social distancing and practicing proper hand hygiene."

UPMC noted this region has some of the lowest vaccination rates in the state, ranging from 35.8% in Bedford County to 52.3% in Cambria County.

"There is a cause-and-effect relationship with low vaccination rates and high demand for emergent health care services that's resulted in the current nationwide demand for services that's outpacing supply, the UPMC statement said.

"This correlates with the area's vaccination rates."

Fockler urged the vaccine-hesitant to talk to their primary care providers for information and not rely on social media or internet searches.

"If you have gone to a doctor in the past for care, why would you not go to them now and get the advice on the vaccine and COVID, rather than look at what somebody says on Facebook?" Fockler queried.

Vaccination numbers are inching higher again across the state. Combining Thursday's updates by the state and Philadelphia health departments shows there are now 7,768,033 Pennsylvanians fully vaccinated. Vaccine providers have administered 18,354,899 doses, including 1,980,577 boosters.

There were 6,918 new positives and 73 additional deaths in Thursday's update by the state health department.

It brings the state totals to 1,806,671 cases and 34,271 deaths attributed to COVID-19 since the pandemic struck last year.

Cambria County added 73 new cases and two additional deaths, Somerset County added 65 cases and three deaths, Bedford County added 33 cases and one death, Blair County added 99 cases and two deaths, Indiana County added 89 cases and two deaths, Clearfield County added 67 cases with no deaths, Centre County added 45 cases and two deaths and Westmoreland County added 236 cases and one death.