Nearly 50,000 Americans are hospitalized with coronavirus as experts warn of growing health care pressure

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Mon, 2020-11-02 09:27 — mike kraft

Nearly 50,000 Americans are hospitalized with coronavirus as experts warn of growing health care pressure The fall surge has left nearly 50,000 people hospitalized across the US due to Covid-19, and experts say the strain health care systems are under could soon get worse. Madeline Holcombe, CNN CNN

(CNN) The fall surge has left nearly 50,000 people hospitalized across the US due to Covid-19, and experts say the strain health care systems are under could soon get worse.

Hospitalizations were on the rise in 47 states last month, according to the Covid Tracking Project, and a total of 47,502 people were hospitalized as of Sunday. The rates come alongside a surge of cases that made October a record setting month for coronavirus infections in the US.

The US recorded its highest number of new cases on Friday with a reported 99,321, the record for any nation in the world. And experts have said that the impacts will likely continue to get worse as colder months drive up infections.

"We're right at the beginning of what looks like exponential growth in a lot of states," Dr. Scott Gottlieb, former commissioner of the US Food and Drug Administration, said on CBS's "Face the Nation" on Sunday. "This is very worrisome as we head into the winter." ...

Dr. Christopher Murray, director of the University of Washington's Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation, said hospitalizations are the best measure of how the nation is faring against the pandemic and are often an indicator of how the number of deaths will trend.

The seven-day average for new cases currently is more than 81,300 -- higher than any other time in the pandemic. The surge has brought cases to more than 9.2 million in the US since the pandemic began, and 230,996 people have died, according to data from Johns Hopkins University. ..

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Hospitals overwhelmed: Exhausted staffs, surging COVID-19 cases push nation's limits The worsening COVID-19 outbreak, fueled by Americans' fatigue, means hospitals are scrambling for more doctors, nurses and therapists to fill shifts. Ken Alltucker USA TODAY

As the United States adds a new coronavirus case every second, hospitals from West Texas to Wisconsin are overwhelmed with the soaring number of critically ill Americans.

In many cases, it’s not a lack of hospital beds, therapies or equipment that worry managersamid the surge, with more than 229,000 deaths from COVID-19 in the U.S. It’s the depleted and exhausted hospitals staffs needed to care for those who need life-sustaining treatment.

The head of the Utah Hospital Association this week warned the situation is getting so dire that hospitals there might soon need to ration care. Hospitals in North and South Dakota are seeking staff reinforcements to care for patients in crowded intensive care units. And in Wisconsin, hospitals are opening makeshift ICU wings even as they desperately look for nurses and other clinicians to staff the facilities. ...

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