LOUISVILLE, Ky. — Escalating cases COVID-19’s delta variant and hospitalizations are continuing to put a strain on healthcare systems statewide.
Gov. Andy Beshear called the situation dire, as the positivity rate is more than 13%.
Over a three-day period (Saturday through Monday), Kentucky reported 9,918 positive cases of the virus. There were also 56 deaths reported during the period also.
During his briefing on Monday, the governor reported 2,198 hospitalizations, 615 in intensive care and 361 on ventilators – which are all-time highs.
The 10 to 19 age demographic are getting the virus at a much higher rate than anyone in the Kentucky population, according to state officials.
To put things in perspective, Beshear said last August there were 2,352 cases found in kids. This year, the numbers increased by 24.5% with 18,909 cases.
Kentucky also reported more than 19,000 cases during the same period. Now, Beshear said more than 77,000 case have been reported.
"This is hitting people of all age groups and making everybody sicker," Beshear said.
As patients become sicker, the more strain it has caused on hospitals around the state.
Beshear said 58 of 96 Kentucky’s hospitals are reporting critical staffing shortages.
In southeastern Kentucky, Baptist Health Corbin said their ICU, PCU, telemetry and med surge beds were all full.
"We have no more capacity in those beds and we've made the decision to close our surgery department to allow us some extra space down there should it be needed," Sherry Mays, vice president and chief nursing officer, said.
Monday, Baptist Health Corbin reported 65 COVID patients with 14 of them on ventilators. Mays said only six of those hospitalized were fully vaccinated.
The hospital has 14 ventilators in use with 10 available and Mays said they are ordering 5 additional if they should happen to need them.
Baptist Health has also seen more obstetric patients and those in the 20 to 60-year-old demographic Mays said are "really sick this time."
She said she and her staff had to get creative staffing is stretched thin.
"The other thing you can actually do for our community is pray for our patients and pray for our staff and our physicians that they'll be resilient during this pandemic and that we can get through it as quickly as possible," Mays said with emotion.
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