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'The hospitals are at capacity now' | Sacramento County reports COVID-19 patients filling hospitals

Health officer Dr. Kasirye said Sacramento County is working with the state in case additional patients need to be taken to another county

SACRAMENTO COUNTY, Calif. — Sacramento County Public Health confirmed Thursday the county has reached another grim milestone. 

Health officer Dr. Olivia Kasirye said hospitals in the county are reporting beds are full.

“The hospitals are at capacity now. We are concerned about the status and the availability of both the general beds, as well as beds in the intensive care unit,” Kasirye said. “With the hospitalizations from the last report that we received, we are at 420 cases of COVID-19 in the hospital, including 106 in the intensive care unit."

Kasirye requested the public take this into account when considering care.

“We are requesting all members of the public to please, if you do not have a true emergency, to use other means of getting care such as testing. And please reserve the emergency room and ambulances for true emergencies,” Kasirye said.

She said the county’s working with the state to determine what comes next. One possible solution could be transporting patients to another county.

While hospitalizations are still below winter surge highs, daily cases and case rates are well above the highs from summer 2020.

“For the cases, we are still averaging about 500 new cases per day. And our case rate is at 31.2,” Kasirye said.

Still, there was a brief positive note when it comes to the trend in daily cases.

“It does look like we have reached a plateau, but there might be some delay in some of the reports, so we’re still cautiously optimistic," Kasirye said.

ABC10 reached out to UC Davis Health for comment on the current situation. 

“Patients who come to UC Davis Health will always receive the care they need. As the area’s only Level 1 trauma center, our hospital is almost always full – even before COVID-19," the statement says. "Adding dozens of COVID-19 patients – who are overwhelmingly unvaccinated – into an already busy hospital does make bed scheduling and care delivery more difficult, but our role in the health care system is to handle whatever patient needs arise. With every hospital being impacted by COVID-19, there isn’t the pre-pandemic level of staffing flexibility that most hospitals use to bring in additional staff when needed. Since our hospital is almost always full, this situation is not as challenging at UC Davis Medical Center, as we are always staffed to serve a full hospital.”

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