The next ‘Titanic’?
Doctors worry COVID-19 could soon overwhelm hospitals
Doctors in Palm Beach County are sounding the alarm: If COVID-19 cases continue to surge, the health care system soon will be overwhelmed and the county could be the next ‘Titanic.’
That dire health warning came during Tuesday morning’s Palm Beach County commission meeting, when officials played a six-minute video from the Palm Beach County Medical Society.
“If this surge rages on, we’ll be out of space in our hospitals and ICUs,” Dr. Kleper de Almeida, an internal medicine and infectious diseases physician, said in the video.
“Once our health care system is overwhelmed, the best possible care can no longer be provided to each patient. Terrible decisions will have to be made over who receives care and who does not. None of us in the medical community want to be forced to make those decisions.”
On Tuesday, the state reported 379 new cases in Palm Beach County, bringing the total to 34,929. A total of 876 people have died, 16 more than reported
on Monday.
Palm Beach County has seen 488 patients hospitalized with a primary diagnosis of the new coronavirus, according to state data. County hospitals currently have a bed capacity of 29.51%. Delray Medical Center (29.66%) and Boca Raton Regional Hospital (27.05%) are both hovering near that figure.
The story is simliar around South Florida. Broward County’s bed capacity stands at 18.65%, while Miami-Dade is 19.61%. Broward County’s hospitals have filled as patients spill over from Miami-Dade, the hardest-hit county in Florida.
“Palm Beach County is now experiencing a dangerous surge in COVID-19 that just a little over a month ago, we hoped we could avoid. In June we were seeing 350-400 cases,” said Dr. Jim Heron, an internal medicine physician. “Now we are seeing an average of 764 new cases every day.”
In the video, doctors emphasized the necessity for people to wear masks, practice social distancing and avoid large gatherings. Citing the surge in cases to viral transmissions from two to four weeks ago, Heron said it will take time to see positive change and that change must happen now, equating the current situation to the story of the doomed ship, the Titanic.
“Rather than slowing down, the captain [of the Titanic] continued to steam forward at a high speed,” Heron said. “Action was taken when it was only obvious the iceberg lay dead ahead, but by that point the cruise’s efforts to slow the ship were futile and we all know what happened next.
“If the COVID-19 hospitalizations continue to double at the current rate, our health care system’s capacity to care for these patients will be exceeded.”
Despite the wary prognosis from area doctors, Palm Beach County Health Department Director Dr. Alina Alonso said she’s been encouraged by the daily rate of positive tests over the past two weeks. During her briefing, Alonso said Palm Beach County has fallen below the 10% positive threshold for 10 of the past 14 days.
“You can see within these last 14 days we have had many days below that goal,” Alonso said. “That is a very good sign we’re going in the right direction. [It’s] very positive.”
One of the main concerns for county officials has been large gatherings, specifically in Lake Worth Beach and the western part of Palm Beach County, which have led to an increased number of cases.
“There is a significant amount of parties resulting from birthdays, weddings, barbecues that bring folks together,” Alonso said. “We see that after these events we have spikes in the number of cases related to those events.”
“It is not the time to have parties or large gatherings of any kind.”
At the moment, the Palm Beach County Sheriff ’s Office hasn’t added any extra measures to crack down on house parties. Spokeswoman Teri Barbera said police will respond to calls if there’s a complaint, but said they haven’t haven’t had many issues.