State prepares for coronavirus

NEW HAVEN — Coronavirus is likely to spread in the United States, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and state and local officials across Connecticut are preparing to deal with a potential outbreak.

Gov. Ned Lamont said Wednesday that the state government was prepared to address the disease, following the drills and procedures it has established. CDC officials reported Tuesday that Covid-19 was likely to spread in the United States in the near future, noting that it had appeared without obvious cause in several countries, which qualifies as “community spread,” the second of three criteria for a global pandemic.

A Yale New Haven Health System official, at the same time, said most people who do become ill wouldn’t require hospitalization.

Yale New Haven adapting

Dr. Richard Martinello, medical director for infection preven

tion for the Yale New Haven Health System, said its five hospitals and Northeast Medical Group staff are continuously re-examining protocols to screen patients who may have traveled to an affected area or been in the company of someone who has and who shows symptoms of the coronavirus.

“One of the challenges that we’re working on now is thinking about how we can adapt the protocols that we’ve set forth,” he said.

All patients are asked whether they have any “signs and symptoms” of the disease, such as cough, fever or trouble breathing, he said. Screening is focused in “the triage desk of our Emergency Departments” at Yale New Haven, Bridgeport, Greenwich, Lawrence + Memorial and Westerly, R.I., hospitals, but it also is occurring in doctors’ offices.

“We are creating a process where we can make decisions about what countries we can add to the list that we currently have,” Martinello said Wednesday. Now, patients are only being asked about China, “and we’re in the process of re-evaluating that,” he said. He said he is increasingly concerned about travelers to South Korea and, to a lesser extent, Japan and Italy.

He said the CDC is “still focused on China” but that Yale New Haven is “recognizing that individual hospitals and doctors’ offices need to be flexible. ... This is changing so rapidly, we need to be adaptable to it.”

“We’ve had people who were in Israel and were in a meeting with people from South Korea who appeared to be sick with a respiratory infection,” Martinello said. “There are a lot of nuances here. We need to be cautious.”

He said that while there have been patients that staff have been concerned about, “we haven’t identified anybody” suffering from the coronavirus. “If any of our staff have a concern, our infectionprevention team is available 24/7,” he said.

“Really over the course of any given day we’re going to see some changes,” he said. The screening questions are being integrated into patients’ electronic health records.

“The important thing right now is we all need to pay careful attention to this,” Martinello said. “Most people who get sick will get a mild, moderate illness that won’t require hospitalization. We do need to avoid unproductive anxiety over this.”

Concerns across the state

Lamont during a press conference Thursday asked residents to have confidence in the state government’s ability to handle the potential impact of coronavirus, noting they had regularly conducted pandemic drills, including this past August, and communicated with health care providers and local and federal agencies regularly.

“This is not a call to make you nervous. It’s a call to give you confidence that we’re ready for what’s going forward here,” said Lamont.

Matthew Carter, director of infectious diseases for the state Department of Public Health, noted the CDC had shifted in recent days from attempting to keep the virus out of the United States to mitigating its effect here, as well. Such a disease, easily spread person-to-person, was always likely to come to our shores, he said. A vaccine would likely not be available for at least a year, he noted.

He said the current moment provided a window of opportunity for preparation, allowing health officials to better address the virus.

“It’s no good pretending that it’s not going to come. I think the old saying is better to prepare for the worst than hope for the best, and right now it’s time to prepare,” said Carter.

Jennifer Jackson, president and CEO of the Connecticut Hospital Association, said hospitals across Connecticut are prepared to treat those battling the virus.

“I want the public to be assured that hospitals are prepared to care for patients

with Covid-19. This is what hospitals do. We regularly prepare, we plan, we train, for outbreaks of disease,” said Jackson. “We have built resiliency into our system. We have experience preparing for Ebola, for H1N1, and every year, for the flu.”

Carter noted that the CDC has guidelines for workplaces and schools to follow in case of a pandemic. In the future, if need be, he said the state might recommend social distancing measures, such as having people stand six feet apart or canceling large gatherings.

Michael Spera, police chief in Old Saybrook and president of the Connecticut Emergency Management Association, wrote to Lamont Wednesday, sharing his concerns about the lack of protective equipment available to emergency responders.

“CEMA is most concerned with the extreme shortage of available personal protective equipment and has called on the Governor to take immediate measure to ensure that healthcare and public safety providers have the personal protective equipment needed to respond to a potential outbreak of the virus in Connecticut,” Spera said in a statement.

The CDC has recommended that those sickened by the virus wear face masks to keep from spreading it to others.

Lamont said officials had been in touch with the state’s congressional delegation about its needs, including masks, so they can accurately lobby for funds from the federal government. Such supplies are now in high demand, he noted, as countries and states prepare to deal with coronavirus.

Students and others

The University of New Haven recommended Tuesday that students and faculty at its Tuscan campus return to the United States “due to the evolving threat of the coronavirus in Europe.” Fairfield University closed its Florence University of the Arts study abroad program Tuesday, bringing 142 students back to the United States. Sacred Heart

University brought home its students studying at John Cabot University in Rome. UConn’s study abroad programs in Italy remain active, but the university Wednesday advised the 88 students studying there to avoid

traveling to areas affected by the coronavirus. Southern Connecticut State University is making arrangement for two students in Italy to return home, while Quinnipiac University Wednesday recommended its students

studying abroad return home , according to HQ Press.

Claudio Furlan / Associated Press A girl wearing a face mask checks her phone in Milan, Italy, on Wednesday. The viral outbreak that began in China has so far caused 374 cases and 12 deaths in Italy.