Missouri sees rise in severe COVID-19 cases among the young, unvaccinated as delta variant spreads

Health care workers in southwest Missouri are sounding the alarm over a wave of young, unvaccinated COVD-19 patients who are now filling hospital beds.

Health care workers in southwest Missouri are sounding the alarm over a wave of young, unvaccinated COVID-19 patients who are now filling hospital beds. Leanne Handle, an assistant nurse manager of a medical surgical COVID-19 unit at CoxHealth in Springfield, Missouri, said she and her staff have seen the patient population over the past year go from elderly people who are immunocompromised or have multiple other conditions to, more recently, younger individuals who "don't think COVID is real" and haven't been vaccinated against the disease. "Right now, our average patient population is anywhere from 30 to 55 [years old]. We have seen patients as young as 18," Handle told ABC News in a self-filmed video diary on Tuesday. "I cannot speak to the pediatric population, as our unit doesn't take care of them." "So, what we're seeing now are the patients who are coming in who don't think that they're going to get sick from it, who aren't mentally prepared to make life and death decisions of do they want to be intubated, do you want CPR if your heart should stop," she added. "We have very few patients who have been admitted that have been vaccinated. So it has been proven to keep you at least out of the hospital, and from severe disease."