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ALERT: ‘Florida is already Wuhan, China’: Doctors sound alarm as Miami-Dade ICUs reach 118 percent of capacity
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Miami-Dade County has been dubbed the new epicenter of COVID-19 in the U.S. as cases surge throughout Florida, and a doctor at one of the state’s largest hospitals is sounding an alarm, comparing the current spike in cases in the county to the first known outbreak in Wuhan, China.
The number of Florida resident deaths has reached 4,805, an increase of 128 since Thursday’s update. Another 107 non-Floridians have died in the state, according to the Florida Department of Health.
As of Friday, ICU bed capacity was at 118% of normal capacity.
Florida has been averaging more than 100 new COVID-19 deaths per day over the last seven days, more than double the figure of two weeks ago. Doctors have predicted a surge in deaths as Florida’s daily reported cases have gone from about 2,000 a day a month ago to over 12,000.
“This spike in cases is like nothing we’ve seen before — not even in New York. Florida has been breaking New York numbers and breaking national records,” Rishi Rattan, a trauma surgeon at Jackson Memorial Hospital in Miami-Dade County, said.
Rattan said it is absolutely worrying to him, and the capacity at the hospital is in flux.
“The patients are coming almost as fast, if not faster than than we can build new spaces and new beds and new areas. So we are expanding the hospital, but every time we build an area, it quickly overflows,” Rattan said.
And as more beds fill to capacity, wait times to get a hospital bed are going to continue to increase.
[link to www.fox5ny.com (secure)]
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