hospitalizations of people with severe covid-19 are at record highs in ottawa and doubling every 12 days, city councillors heard in a somber pandemic update wednesday.
by late next week, there could be 200 covid-19 patients in ottawa hospitals. that compares to a high of 63 during the pandemic’s first wave.
“we are really not in a good place and things could go very badly in ottawa in the next few weeks in terms of our hospitals’ abilities to keep up,” said ottawa’s deputy medical officer of health, dr. brent moloughney.
“we have never seen anything like this before.”
with hospitals in the city expanding intensive care units and cheo, for the first time, opening icu beds to adult patients, the pressure on the health system is becoming unsustainable, moloughney said.
“if this trend continues, the health care system will have extreme difficulty keeping up.”
while vaccinations are ramping up, moloughney says the city will not be able to vaccinate its way out of the current crisis. only the efforts of the public to stay home and follow public health advice to reduce transmission will make a difference.
on march 18, 24 patients were admitted to ottawa hospitals with covid-19. as of april 11, there were 96. that number is expected to reach 200 next week and potentially 400, with 120 patients in intensive care units, in coming weeks if the trend continues, he said.