COVID-19: Alberta’s 5th wave flooding hospitals has health-care workers consider early return
Global News
A statement from an AHS spokesperson said they are "extremely concerned by the recent surge in COVID-19 cases, both in the community and in our hospitals."
The fifth wave of the COVID-19 pandemic is playing out differently in Alberta hospitals this time.
“I think it’s different this time because there are so many health care workers who are getting sick themselves,” Reanne Booker, an oncology and palliative care nurse who volunteered to work in the Foothills Hospital intensive care unit, told Global News.
“So we’ve got this convergence now of a rapidly-increasing number of people getting infected and our health care systems getting overwhelmed just by the sheer number of people who need care, but then we also have health-care workers who are themselves falling ill and having to take time off work.
“So it’s this perfect storm of bad things that are happening all at once. And so that’s really stretching things in terms of capacity.”
A statement from an AHS spokesperson said they are “extremely concerned by the recent surge in COVID-19 cases, both in the community and in our hospitals.”
“We are starting to see some impact to health-care services due to staffing challenges, particularly at some acute care services at rural sites due to staff illness or isolation,” Kerry Williamson said.
According to data from Alberta Health, hospitalizations in the province have increased by 59.1 per cent between Jan. 4 and 11. In Calgary, hospitalizations jumped by 56.7 per cent and ICU admissions by 54.5 per cent in the same week-long period.
On Wednesday, the province reported 748 were in hospital with COVID-19, with 82 in ICU. Calgary’s hospitals currently have 304 COVID-19 patients in them.