Latest Pa. has more COVID-19 patients on ventilators now than at any point during pandemic
As the pandemic has unfolded, physicians have learned how to use ventilators more selectively and sparingly on critically ill patients because the invasive breathing support can do more harm than good.
Still, with far more hospitalizations than in the spring, Pennsylvania has more COVID-19 patients on ventilators now than at the April peak.
The 7-day average number of COVID-19 hospitalizations in the Keystone state is more than 5,700, compared to 2,700 in April, according to the COVID Tracking Project, which uses data from each state. On Monday, 697 COVID-19 patients were on ventilators, surpassing the April peak of 685.
Pennsylvania hospitals have dramatically increased their inventory of ventilators over the past six months, so they are not in danger of a shortage of the devices. The state health departments lists a total of 5,397 ventilators, of which 1,862 are in use – including by non-COVID patients.
In Philadelphia, there were 897 COVID-19 patients in hospitals on Monday, including 118 on ventilators, the city health department reported.
At the start of the pandemic, doctors put patients on mechanical ventilators as soon as they needed six liters of oxygen a minute delivered through nose prongs. Clinicians didn’t want to wait for a dire emergency that would leave the medical team without enough time to don protective gear before placing a tube down the patient’s throat, a procedure that releases virus-laden droplets into the air.
But a number of studies, including an analysis published in the American Journal of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene, suggested that physicians could reduce the high death rate for ventilated COVID-19 patients by first trying less invasive breathing support. Guidelines now suggest trying machines similar to those use at home to treat apnea, and devices that deliver heated, humidified, high-flow oxygen.
— Marie McCullough
Health officials warn Pa. residents to stay home when possible as cases, hospitalizations continue to rise
As Pennsylvanians received a dose of good news Monday — the first doses of Pfizer’s coronavirus vaccine being given to health care workers — Health Secretary Rachel Levine warned residents not to let their guards down just yet. With cases and hospitalizations continuing to rise to record levels, it is essential that residents stay home whenever possible and follow the temporary restrictions announced last week, she said.
”We need all Pennsylvanians to look at these mitigation measures as an opportunity to buy us time,” Levine said. “We need to get through what could be a very challenging winter before the vaccines are widely available.”
Health care workers have been challenged for weeks by the virus’ fall resurgence, she said, and on Monday morning Pennsylvania hospitals were treating 5,970 coronavirus patients, more than they have on any other day since the pandemic began in March. Of those patients, 1,227 were in intensive care units, some of which have few or no beds left, Levine said.
On Monday, Pennsylvania reported 55 additional deaths from coronavirus-related complications. It also added 129 deaths that were reported Sunday.
The commonwealth on Monday also logged 7,962 additional confirmed coronavirus cases, as well as 10,684 new cases that were reported Sunday.
The statewide percent positivity of tests climbed to 16.2% last week, according to state data.
In all, at least 499,764 Pennsylvanians have contracted the coronavirus since March and 12,565 have died.
— Erin McCarthy
Fauci says U.S. could reach ‘herd immunity’ against coronavirus by late spring or early summer
Anthony Fauci, the nation’s top infectious disease expert, said it’s possible that most healthy Americans could receive the coronavirus vaccine as early as the end of March or the begging of April, depending on “the efficiency of the rollout.”
Fauci, speaking during an interview on MSNBC Monday, called it a “historic day” as health care workers across the country began receiving vaccine shots less than a year into a pandemic that has killed nearly 300,000 Americans. Today’s vaccinations brings the U.S. one step closer to “herd immunity” against the virus, which Fauci said would be achieved when an overwhelming majority of the population receives the vaccine.
“I believe if we’re efficient about it, and we convince people to get vaccinate, we can accomplish that by the end of the second quarter of 2021, namely by the end of late spring, early summer,” Fauci said.
Fauci said he still plans to receive the vaccine publicly in order to help promote its safety and efficacy, and said that could take place sometime this week.
“Hopefully that will encourage many more people to get vaccinated,” Fauci said.
— Rob Tornoe
Pa. health secretary reiterates general public likely won’t receive vaccine before the spring
Pennsylvania Health Secretary Rachel Levine called Monday “a new chapter in this fight” against the coronavirus as the first doses of Pfizer’s two-shot vaccine were given to front line health care workers in Pittsburgh. Some of Philadelphia’s health care workers are to get their first shots in the coming days.
Pennsylvania is set to receive 97,500 doses this week via direct shipments to 83 hospitals across the commonwealth, she said. Those numbers do not include doses being sent to facilities in Philadelphia.
The hospitals receiving these first shipments are hospitals with ultra-cold storage units and the capability to administer about 1,000 doses in a short period of time, she said. More specific information will be released soon, once hospitals notify the commonwealth that they have received shipments of the vaccine. Hospitals have been advised not to keep half of the allotment for workers’ second doses, Levine said. Operation Warp Speed will be reserving and storing second doses for all of the doses distributed this week, she said, and shipping those out to hospitals in three weeks so workers can get their second shots.
“It’s tremendously exciting,” Levine said of the positive news amid a dark year. But “mitigation now is more important than ever during these winter months.”
She reiterated that the general public likely won’t be vaccinated before the spring, she said.
Pennsylvania will receive additional shipments of the Pfizer vaccine in the weeks to come, but Levine said she did not have a solid estimate of how many doses would be included in those future shipments.
Front line health care workers and residents of long-term care facilities will be among those who could get their first doses of the vaccine by the month’s end. Residents and staff of those facilities won’t be vaccinated this week, Levine said, but may get their first doses in the coming weeks.
Other front line workers, such as first responders, will be among the next group of people to be vaccinated.
If the Moderna vaccine receives emergency use authorization, it could also be shipped out across the commonwealth next week, Levine added.
”It’s tremendously satisfying to be able to get the vaccine and to start immunizing, but we have to be realistic as well,” Levine said. “It is going to take a significant period of time to roll out the vaccine through the three phases and to immunize the public.”
Gov. Tom Wolf and his staff have not yet determined when they will be vaccinated, Levine said.
— Erin McCarthy
First Pennsylvania health workers receive COVID-19 vaccine
With a brief warning of, “Here we go,” University of Pittsburgh Medical Center’s Tami Minnier injected one of Pennsylvania’s first doses of COVID-19 vaccine just after 11 a.m. Monday morning into the shoulder of a nurse practitioner.
“We clearly have weeks and months to go, but we are so excited to take this first step today,” said Minnier, a registered nurse and the hospital’s chief quality officer.
The recipient, Charmaine Pykosh, receiving her inoculation before a room of photographers, gave a thumbs up and indicated that beneath her mask she was smiling.
“They told me to smile with my eyes,” said the acute care nurse practitioner, who has worked at UPMC for 30 years.
She was among five front line workers at the Pittsburgh hospital to receive the long awaited vaccine. While some doses have arrived in the state, health officials anticipate batches arriving through Wednesday. The initial recipients of the vaccine will be exclusively health care workers in hospitals and nursing homes, though Philadelphia health officials have said some long term care facility residents could receive the vaccine before the end of the year.
Minnier compared Monday’s shots for an illness that has infected more than 16 million Americans and killed 291,017 to a vaccine for polio, a virus that once killed 2 to 5% of all children infected and up to 15 to 30% of adults.
“This moment is happening just a few miles from another historical time that happened here in Pittsburgh over 65 years ago. April 12, 1955 Doctor Jonas Salk took some of these same steps,” Minnier said.
— Jason Laughlin
COVID-19 vaccine wasn’t tested in pregnancy, but experts say it’s still worth considering if you’re expecting
As health-care workers prepare to receive Pfizer’s COVID-19 vaccine starting this week, a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention committee has recommended that pregnant workers — a group typically excluded from vaccine trials — still be allowed to decide with their doctors whether to receive the vaccine.
The majority of health-care workers are women, and Johns Hopkins University researchers noted in STAT News last week that an estimated 330,000 in this workforce “will be pregnant or breastfeeding as initial doses of vaccine are being distributed.” Even more could become pregnant in the weeks between administration of the two doses of vaccine required for full protection from the virus.
Pregnant women were not included in Pfizer’s vaccine trials earlier this year, but about two dozen people who got the vaccine became pregnant while participating in the studies. None reported complications.
Paul Offit, a pediatrician who directs the Vaccine Education Center at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, said that although there were not sufficient data on the vaccine in pregnancy, there is no “real or even theoretical risk for pregnancy or the unborn child,” because of how the Pfizer vaccine is made.
Still, for pregnant women unwilling to be inoculated, careful precautions can protect them while the virus continues to rage. “The best thing you can do is mask and social-distance,” Offit said.
— Aubrey Whelan
Wolf, Murphy push for new stimulus package to help families, businesses and local governments
Govs. Phil Murphy and Tom Wolf again pleaded with federal leaders to pass another stimulus package to send relief money to their states, saying the future of New Jersey and Pennsylvania’s economies depend on it.
“The entire country is crying out to you to do it,” Wolf said.
He and Murphy made the comments on a Zoom call with Zac Petkanas of Protect Our Care, a healthcare advocacy organization that created a Coronavirus War Room in March.
Murphy said that paycheck protection funds and other federal aid helped keep businesses and residents afloat in the spring, and that more would keep frontline workers employed through the next few months.
“The longer this goes on the more costly it will be, and the more suffering there will be associated with it,” Murphy said. “It’s to give us a bridge over troubled water over the next couple of months.”
Wolf said he was “deeply disappointed” with “weak” Republican leadership over the last year, saying more money was needed for families as well as businesses, particularly restaurants.
“It’s disgraceful that when record numbers of America are dying or being hospitalized, our federal leaders seem incapable of providing Americans with desperately needed support,” he said. “The restaurant and bar industry should not have to bear the brunt of a global pandemic on their own.”
Federal money is also needed to expedite vaccine distribution, they said. “These are logistical challenges that cost money, and we need help with that,” Wolf said.
— Allison Steele
New York City nurse one of the first Americans to receive coronavirus vaccine
Sandra Lindsay, a nurse who works in the intensive care unit at the Long Island Jewish Medical Center in New York City, was among the first Americans not part of a clinical trial to receive the coronavirus vaccine.
Lindsay said she was feeling well after receiving the vaccine, which was administered during a livestream Monday morning that aired on most cable news networks.
“I feel like healing is coming. I hope this marks the beginning to the end of a very painful time in our history,” Lindsay said.
— Rob Tornoe
Pennsylvania, New Jersey will offer coronavirus briefings Monday
Officials in Pennsylvania and New Jersey will offer coronavirus updates on Monday. Here’s a schedule of how to watch and stream:
— Rob Tornoe
New COVID-19 restrictions go into effect in Delaware
New COVID-19 restrictions are now in effect in Delaware, where COVID-19 cases continue to climb and more people are hospitalized than at any point during the pandemic.
The new restrictions, which will remain in place until Jan. 11, include a 10 p.m. curfew on restaurants and bars and capacity reductions for retail stores and businesses. The restrictions also cap exercise classes at gyms at 10 people and require people to remain at least 13 feet apart from each other, unless they live in the same household.
Delaware said it will fine any business that violates the new restrictions. A second violation will result in the business being shut down until they submit a reopening plan that’s approved by the state’s Department of Health.
“These additional restrictions are intended to protect Delaware’s hospital capacity and protect lives this winter,” Gov. John Carney said in a statement. “Health care workers are on the job around the clock, caring for the sick. We all need to follow their lead and do our part to protect others.”
— Rob Tornoe
Most Americans could start getting vaccines in March if other candidates are approved, Azar says
While most Americans will have to wait several months to receive the coronavirus vaccine, the wait might not be all that long if one or two additional vaccine candidates are approved, Health and Human Serves Secretary Alex Azar said Monday morning.
During an interview on the Today show, Azar said the United States has enough vaccine doses to inoculate upwards of 20 million people by the end of December, and as many as 50 million people by the end of January.
Those vaccinations will mostly go to front line health care workers and nursing home residents, but Azar said the general population could start receiving shots by the end of February if one or two additional COVID-19 vaccines are approved by the government.
“If we get true Johnson & Johnson or AstraZeneca vaccine approved in January when their data comes in, we’ll have significant additional supply,” Azar said. “By late February into March time period, you’ll start seeing much more like a flu vaccination campaign.”
—Rob Tornoe
Some Pa. hospitals face staff shortages as cases continue to soar
Nearly 6,000 patients were hospitalized with COVID-19 in Pennsylvania Sunday as hospitals in the western part of the commonwealth face staff shortages.
The Department of Health reported 5,970 COVID-19 hospitalizations on its dashboard as of Sunday night, a 35% jump from two weeks ago, when 4,405 patients were hospitalized. A total of 1,227 COVID-19 patients were being treated in intensive care, and 672 patients were on ventilators.
Pennsylvania is averaging 10,241 new cases a day over the past seven days, according to an Inquirer analysis. Overall, 481,118 Pennsylvania residents have tested positive for coronavirus through Saturday, the most recent day the commonwealth reported data.
The test positivity rate increased to 16.2% last week, up from 14.4% the prior week and 11.7% two weeks before, according to state data.
Across the river, New Jersey is averaging 4,935 new cases a day, the most at any point during the pandemic. Nearly 3,600 patients were hospitalized with COVID-19 in the state on Sunday, the most since mid-May but still far below a peak of 8,270 patients during the spring.
“For all the good news — the light at the end of the tunnel and the vaccine exemplifies that as much as anything — the next number of weeks are going to be hell, I fear,” Murphy said Sunday on ABC’s This Week. “So we’re begging people to please, please, please don’t let your guard down, even when you’re in private settings.”
— Rob Tornoe
First coronavirus vaccine doses on their way as New Jersey plans first shots for Tuesday
The first batch of nearly 3 million coronavirus vaccine vials began to make their way across the country Sunday, packed in dry ice on board trucks and cargo planes bounded for distribution sites in every state.
New Jersey’s first 76,000 doses will be administered at University Hospital in Newark on Tuesday, Gov. Phil Murphy said in a Sunday tweet. They have been allotted for health-care workers and residents and staff of long-term care facilities.
In Philadelphia, where 15,000 doses are expected to arrive the same day in the first shipment to what city Health Commissioner Thomas Farley described as “a small number of hospitals,” they will be redistributed to other facilities so vaccinations can begin Wednesday. Farley did not specify which hospitals would be serving as distribution sites.
“The first health-care workers in the city — the people who are exposed to COVID every single day — will get the opportunity to get the vaccine,” Farley said during an online event hosted by NBC10.
Delaware is expected to receive 8,775 initial doses of the vaccine within the next few days, and can begin inoculating health care workers within 24 hours of their receipt, Gov. John Carney announced Sunday.
“This vaccine will help protect our health care workers who are working day and night to care for the sick and save lives,” Carney said in a statement. “But we are not in the clear yet. We are still in for a very difficult winter.”
— Katie Park and Rob Tornoe
Monday morning roundup: COVID-19 has killed one in 500 N.J. residents
- One in 500 New Jerseyans have died from COVID-19 since pandemic began, according to an NJ Advance Media analysis of data. If New Jersey were a country, it would have the highest coronavirus per capita death toll in the world, though it is weathering the latest wave of COVID-19 infections better than other states.
- Pennsylvania’s Department of Corrections defied federal guidelines and a doctor’s order last week, demanding that an officer who tested positive for COVID-19 come back to work at a prison struggling to contain the spread.
- Chris Sununu, the Republican governor of New Hampshire, lashed out at members of his own party for refusing to wear masks after state House Speaker Dick Hinch died of COVID-19. “For those who are just out there doing the opposite just to make some ridiculous political point, it is horribly wrong,” Sununu said. “Please use your heads. Don’t act like a bunch of children, frankly.”
- “The state of Indiana is on fire,” Gov. Eric Holcomb said last week, ordering hospitals to delay elective surgeries beginning Wednesday as COVID-19 cases overwhelm the state’s health care system.
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