SC Hospitalizations Decline for a Second Straight Day
Even as Suffolk County residents dealt with a storm that had knocked out power in 10,000 homes by 3 p.m., hospitals that have been in the center of the coronavirus storm experienced a second straight day of improving numbers.
The number of people hospitalized in the county dropped 19 to 1,595, according to County Executive Steve Bellone (D).
“That is not enough to tell us that we’ve seen the worst of this at this point, but it is another positive indicator,” Bellone said.
The number of residents in Intensive Care Unit beds also declined by nine to 539, while the number of patients who are intubated also declined by one.
“To see all three of those numbers down, however slightly, is a positive,” the county executive said.
Suffolk County, along with the entire State of New York, has been at the epicenter of the COVID-19 pandemic, with the number of people testing positive, sick with the virus, in the hospital, or among those felled by the disease rising rapidly since the first reported positive test on March 9.
Gov. Andrew Cuomo said such numbers, while still horrific in seeing the number of deaths from Easter Sunday, represents a “flattening of the curve,” with the increase in deaths finally showing a slow down.
The county bed capacity, meanwhile, continued to rise, as area hospitals follow through on plans to double the bed capacity, particularly if the recent drops in hospitalizations become a momentary pause before more residents need urgent medical care.
In the last day, area hospitals have increased bed capacity by 57, bringing the total to 3,423 for the county, which includes 756 ICU beds. The overall number of beds available is 717, with 103 ICU beds currently vacant.
Adding to the string of positive developments over the last two days, hospitals also discharged 125 patients who had received treatment.
Hospital gowns remains the biggest supplies need for hospitals, Bellone said.
The county has 772 ventilators, with 262 currently available.
“At this point, with where we are with the numbers, unless we see a significant spike [in demand], I am comfortable with where we are on the ventilators,” Bellone said.
In an ongoing trend amid more widespread testing, residents continue to test positive for the virus. Over the last 24 hours, the number who tested positive climbed by over 1,000 to 21,947. Amid the storm today, mobile testing sites in hotspots including Huntington Station, Brentwood and Riverhead were closed, although Bellone is “expecting to have the sites back on track tomorrow.”
The number of people who have died from complications connected to coronavirus continues to rise. An additional 50 people died, bringing the total in the county to 568.
