D2 You make a good point here, and thanks for sharing this story. This highlights part of what I meant in my previous post by a media that just goes looking for a story to sensationalize. The media is 100% hyping covid. They have been since it started. However, you do also have some hospitals that are definitely hitting capacity due to covid. As I said before, this is where its so hard to remain realistic and grounded in what the real situation is. If you buy into the media hype you would be lead to believe that the sky is falling, that hospitals all over the country are being over run, and that people are dieing just trying to get in. That would be completely false. However, if you go too far the other way, and just dismiss it all because you are fed up with it, as many of us are, then you also miss the truth. The reality is somewhere in the middle. Some hospitals are overrun, and then I know of some who have empty halls.
Its also important to note that it doesn't take a lot really to overrun a hospitals emergency and ICU capacity. Part of the problem with covid is that the folks who do end up in the hospital end up there often times for many days or even weeks. If you have had any dealings with a hospital in the previous years you may have noticed they really like to try and discharge as soon as possible. They are not able to discharge these covid patients. Also, what many may not know, but I am aware of because of my wife being a director of nursing at a facility, is that many nursing homes and other facilities end up sending all of their covid positives out of their facilities and to the hospital or to other facilities that have covid units set up. This ends up causing certain facilities to just get over run, and then leads to stories like we see. If this were the flu for example, none of these facilities would be sending people out of their facilities, but because of covid restrictions, you can not keep covid positives in a nursing home for example without having a covid unit or something in place to isolate. Essentially this contributes to the problem of certain facilities being crowded. Unless you know the full behind the scenes on this though you would be lead to believe that your local hospital is being flooded by people walking in about to die of covid. If this were the flu for example, the care load would be much more spread out; you wouldn't have flu positives being immediately transferred out of nursing homes for example to some other facility. They would stay put and be treated there, and you would never know or hear about it.
All that said, it is true that for those nurses in these hospitals that are being flooded, it is a nightmare. My wife works with and has to coordinate with local area hospitals, and she has friends inside some of these covid units here in Florida. The stories we hear from these nurses is indeed tragic, and it is day after day after day. One of our friends who is a very good nurse and in one of these hospitals told us the other evening that she is looking to get out and work elsewhere, that she can not continue to watch 30 and 40 year olds die day after day. She says she has went home and cried until she cant cry anymore. She is exhausted from the work load, and emotionally exhausted from the toll it is taking. This is true for MANY of these nurses in the middle of this. Hospitals are throwing big bonuses and incentives at nurses just to try and prevent them from walking off the job, and that often still isnt enough. If all I knew was what we hear form those particular nurses, you would be gripped in fear and think my god, we are doomed. However here yet again, I try my best to find perspective. The reality is that these nurses are so close to the problem, and at such a volume of time (50, 60, 70 hours a week) that covid is consuming their lives. Also the issue I highlighted above, that these hospitals are essentially the sponges for the local area, often absorbing a lot of the worst covid cases from all in the area. The nurse I mention here who spoke about the dieing 30 and 40 year olds told us about various cases, and it was clear it affected her watching these younger people die. You can imagine how this could make you feel if you were in her shoes. Wow covid is just killing our young people. The reality though is that for every one of those killed, there have been thousands that age who got it and had mild illness. When you are in the middle of the worst hell of it though, as these nurses are, it is very easy to be consumed by the horror of the few dieing, and if not careful can warp your perspective into feeling like that young people are just dropping like flies.
