***See the update at the bottom of this diary for what to do if you test positive for Covid — even fully vaccinated people need to be concerned with Omicron now spreading rapidly.***
Covid patient waited 40 hours in Cardiff hospital A&E
(A&E is Brit-speak for Emergency Room — Accident & Emergency)
Four days after testing positive for Covid, 48 year-old Ian Cottrell began having difficulty breathing.
"I phoned 111 as I was meant to do. That escalated to 999, who told me there were no ambulances."
Mr Cottrell's husband drove him to the hospital and they arrived at about 22.30.
"I was seen within about half an hour by a triage nurse, who took me into a little room and asked me a few questions to establish what was wrong with me."
So far, so good, right?
But it was not until 04:30 the next morning, Mr Cottrell said, that he was invited into the main reception.
"At that point I was given a seat," Mr Cottrell said.
"I thought I would be getting a bed. The two most important things, if you've got Covid, are to try and rest and to try and sleep.
"I sat on that chair from 4.30am on Wednesday, December 1, until 2pm the following day. So from 10.30pm on the Tuesday night when I went in, until 2pm on the Thursday I spent 40 hours in A&E."
He said he considered discharging himself.
"There were others that were shouting, lying on the floors because there were no beds," he said.
"They were saying they were going to discharge themselves.
"It's chaos in there. No one knows what's going on. It seems like there's no duty of care to anyone."
Given oxygen, steroids and antibiotics on arrival, Mr Cottrell said he then received little to no support until the following day.
Before any Republican picks up on this as ‘proof’ about the horrors of socialized medicine, this is what’s happening in the U.K. right now.
UK records above 80,000 new daily cases for only fourth time since pandemic began
The UK detected 82,886 new Covid cases on Sunday, a 72% jump on the 48,071 new infections recorded last Sunday.
A further 45 people died from Covid-related reasons, down from 111 on Friday.
Sunday’s figures are slightly lower than recent record-breaking daily case rates – it was above 90,000 on Thursday. Reported figures tend to be lower at weekends.
It comes after the UK reported 12,133 new cases of the highly transmissable Omicron variant, taking the total tally to 37,101. (The majority of cases are not sequenced.)
Updated at 11.46am EST
Back to Mr. Cottrell
After experiencing terrible conditions for hours, during which he was told he would be getting a bed several times but didn’t, he eventually did get finally get taken to a ward.
Mr Cottrell was discharged from hospital six days later.
He said his care on the Covid ward was exemplary, but believed his initial wait caused his condition to deteriorate.
"That 40 hours in A&E. I do not know how people have got the will to carry on," he said.
A Cardiff and Vale health board spokesman said: "Our emergency unit remains under extreme pressure through the winter period, intensified by the strain brought about by the pandemic.
"Patient experience support staff and colleagues from the British Red Cross have been providing valuable support for patients who can unfortunately face lengthy waits at times."
emphasis added
Yeah, the English still do world-class understatement.
Not stated anywhere in the article is whether or not Mr. Cottrell had been vaccinated. Given that he survived, odds are that he had been. If so, that means he’s a ‘breakthrough’ case — which may become a meaningless distinction as the Omicron variant appears able to infect vaccinated people, although vaccination still seems to limit the damage it can do.
Meanwhile...
If you haven’t gotten a booster yet, don’t put it off. It makes a difference. The push is on in NYC and for good reason.
Finding their city in the middle of a winter wave of new COVID-19 infections, Mayor Bill de Blasio and Mayor-elect Eric Adams delivered a Sunday address to promote vaccinations and booster shots to try and curb the current spread that has already delivered record pandemic numbers.
In the span of a week, New York City has found itself in the midst of an "omicron wave," with the number of people testing positive for the virus doubling in a matter of days and setting all-time records for single-day reporting.
The state broke its own record for a third day in a row Sunday, reporting almost 22,500 cases. More than 12,000 of those new positive cases came from the city, according to state data, reflecting another record-high for the Big Apple as well. In the past four days alone, 0.5% of the state has tested positive for COVID-19.
emphasis added
This is what anti-vaxxers don’t get — what is happening in the hospitals while they deny the pandemic is real or anything to worry about. 0.5% does not look like that big a number, until you realize that out of 20 million people, that’s 100,000 — in just four days. Here’s the rest of the story: 21,200 is the total number of inpatient hospital beds in New York State—approximately 2.5 beds for every 1,000 people.
It’s not just about beds either — that doesn’t include staffing. Numbers that work for ‘normal’ healthcare demand do not in a pandemic.
The general public doesn’t seem to be aware of how things are either. I have a friend who works on an ambulance crew — they’ve been constantly on the go for days now. Heaven help you if you have any other reasons to go to an emergency room or get routine medical care.
That link is from November in NYC — things have gone downhill in the U.S. since then.
Right on the heels of neighboring New York, New Jersey too is combating a spike in cases with daily infections close to reaching an 11-month high.
New Jersey reported 6,533 new lab-confirmed cases Sunday, giving the Garden State its second-highest day of positive infections and a fourth day above 6,200. The latest single-day report is an increase of more than 85% over last Sunday.
Hospitalizations are on the rise too, up 14% in a week to levels last recorded in April.
Mr. Cottrell has one thing going for him — it's not likely he’s going to be handed a giant medical bill for his stay in the hospital since he’s living in the U.K.. And as bad as his experience was, at least he had a hospital to go to.
Red states where the anti-vaxxers roam ‘free’ are in many cases states that refused to take the ObamaCare money to expand Medicaid. Result: nearly 200 hospitals in rural areas, many in those states, have closed since 2005. Texas is the big ‘winner’.
#1. Texas
– Total rural hospitals closed since 2005: 24 (16 in small or isolated rural communities)
– Total beds lost: 880
Texas leads the country in the number of rural hospital closings, and like other Southern states, it has not expanded its Medicaid coverage under the ACA. In early 2021, the Biden administration rescinded a waiver that allowed Texas to be reimbursed for uncompensated care for patients without health insurance and to be paid for health care reaching low-income residents. The move has so far not pushed Texas toward Medicaid expansion, although the Texas Legislature has increased funding for higher Medicaid reimbursement rates. The number of rural hospitals has fallen from about 300 in the 1960s to 158 today, with more than 20 communities affected by the hospital closures.
And that doesn’t include the health care services lost in Texas because of the extreme anti-abortion measures imposed on clinics that also provided routine healthcare — including immunizations.
All in all, despite what he went through, Mr. Cottrell is lucky — at least he doesn’t have to worry about Republicans trying to kill him.
One more thing: we’d better start making testing available and more frequent. Free kits on demand would be a good start.
UPDATE: As if things weren’t already looking double plus ungood:
The Massachusetts Senator, 72, announced her diagnosis Sunday in a statement shared on Twitter. Warren is fully vaccinated.
"I regularly test for COVID & while I tested negative earlier this week, today I tested positive with a breakthrough case," the Democrat said in her statement.
"Thankfully, I am only experiencing mild symptoms & am grateful for the protection provided against serious illness that comes from being vaccinated & boosted," she added.
In a second tweet, Warren encouraged others to do their part and get vaccinated before providing a link to Vaccines.gov, where individuals can look up local vaccination locations.
"As cases increase across the country, I urge everyone who has not already done so to get the vaccine and the booster as soon as possible — together, we can save lives," she wrote.
Additional update on this: Senator Cory Booker has also tested Covid positive. Both Senators are fully vaccinated and boosted, and only experiencing mild symptoms so far. Fingers crossed.
Trolls descended on the Senators, like far-right journalist Andy Ngo, who tweeted at Booker, “You received three shots and still became infected?”
Getting vaccinated is not a bulletproof solution against covid-19, as just about any expert will tell you at this point, but it does protect you from severe disease and death. The new omicron variant in particular seems to evade the vaccines, but it’s still better to be vaccinated than not, as Ngo surely knows.
The two Senators weren’t the only lawmakers to test positive over the weekend. Rep. Jason Crow of Colorado, also a Democrat, also announced on Sunday that he’d contracted covid-19.
For those keeping score at home, Ballotpedia has been tracking officials and candidates who have become infected, and those who have died — or at least the ones who have announced it publicly.
Update: What to do if you test positive for Covid
The story with the Omicron variant so far suggests that even fully vaccinated and boosted people need to be aware that it may infect them. The New York Times has an article on what to do for anyone who gets a positive test. The link below should allow access through the paywall. You may want to print the article out and keep it handy. READ THE WHOLE THING!
The Omicron variant has fueled a rise in Covid-19 cases across the United States. Here’s what you need to know if you get infected.
This list was put together by Dani Blum at the Well Desk. Here’s the questions people will be asking, and the best answers as of December 20, 2021 can be found at the link.
- I just tested positive. What do I do now?
- What does it mean to isolate?
- Should I take a second test to confirm the result?
- Can I find out if I got Omicron?
- Who do I tell that I tested positive?
- What treatment options do I have?
- When can I stop isolating?
- What if I’m exposed to someone who tested positive?
- I’ve already had Covid. Am I at risk for reinfection?
A couple of additional suggestions. If you can find some N95 masks, keep them handy for when you do have to go out. You may also want to pick up some test kits now so that if you start to feel symptoms of Covid or are exposed to someone who has it, you can test yourself right away. This is especially important for anyone traveling this holiday season to visit friends and family.
Oh, and if you haven’t got a good digital thermometer and something to measure your blood oxygen levels yet, you might want to have those on hand as well.
*Note — I tried to find home test kits while running errands Monday. The two places I looked were all sold out. One might get more in tomorrow. Haven’t looked for N-95 masks, but I expect a similar situation. I was able to get an oximeter, but only by buying it in a combo pack with a digital thermometer and a blood pressure kit. I did not see any oximeters for sale separately.
Monday, Dec 20, 2021 · 11:51:21 PM +00:00 · xaxnar
Update: Omicron is now the dominant strain in the US. From The NY Times
“The extremely contagious Omicron variant is now the dominant version of new coronavirus cases in the United States, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and has prompted the resumption of mask mandates in some cities and states in the Northeast, where the growth in new cases has been particularly steep.
Omicron, first discovered overseas around Thanksgiving and identified in this country on Dec. 1, now accounts for more than 70 percent of new cases in the United States, according to federal estimates released Monday.
The estimates underscored the rapid spread of the new variant. Two weeks ago, the C.D.C. said Omicron accounted for just 1 percent of U.S. cases; a week ago, it was about 13 percent. Delta, which for months had been the dominant form of the virus, accounted for about 26 percent of new cases over the last week, the C.D.C. estimated.”
In other news, it looks like the media is preparing to declare Biden has failed to get the pandemic under control. Never mind that the rest of the world is also dealing with this, or that Republicans and right wing media have been aiding and abetting Covid for months.