JACKSONVILLE, Fla. – As more and more frontline healthcare workers get the vaccine in Jacksonville, more and more patients are coming down with the virus.
Since Thanksgiving, the number of patients with the coronavirus in Duval County has increased to levels not seen since the middle of August.
While ICU and COVID-19 wards are not full in the area, the wards are filling up with more patients.
As of this Friday morning at the five Baptist Health facilities in the area, there were 111 cases with 17 in ICU. The Agency for Health Care Administration reported Friday afternoon that 272 patients were hospitalized in Duval County because of a “primary” diagnosis of COVID-19.
Dr. Elizabeth Ransom of Baptist Health said the hospital is keeping a very close eye on this.
“We do have the capacity and the capability to manage this. We have enough PPE. We’ve been stockpiling for months now, so we feel good about that. And the best news is, as you said, we’re starting to get our frontline staff vaccinated,” Ransom said.
It’s the same at UF Health Jacksonville at two hospitals. There are 56 coronavirus cases and 12 people are in the ICU.
As more people around the community get tested, we’re getting a better idea of hospitalizations throughout Northeast Florida.
New data from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services gives us a weekly snapshot of the situation at hospitals News4Jax hasn’t heard from regularly.
For example, we now know that at the three Ascension St. Vincent’s hospitals in the area, for the seven days ending Dec. 10, on average had a combined 96 COVID-19 patients with 29 patients in ICUs.
At Memorial Hospital, there was an average of 25 COVID-19 patients in that same period with six in ICU.
Orange Park Medical Center had 36 patients with seven in ICU while Flagler Hospital had 26 people with COVID-19 with six in the ICU.
While the numbers are a reason for concern, doctors said people are getting better.
“Thankfully we are not seeing a big uptick in fatalities, thank goodness, and we hope that we don’t,” said Ransom.