Oldest person we have in ICU right now is mid 60s. Almost everyone on 40s and 50s. Average age around 51ish.

Crazy.

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Going out on a limb here to say that 95% to even 100% of the ICU patients were not vaccinated. Again, I see this as a situation where the spike is affecting the "younger" patients b/c most older ones are already vaccinated so won't require ICU or hospital bed if they breakthrough and the younger were either on the fence about vaccinating or just decided not to. The younger vaccinated are not what is filling up beds. Is this strand of Covid that much better at hurting and attacking the younger, under 60 person or is it still mainly a pandemic of the unvaccinated. Maybe the delta variant does spread easier than others, but it's still the unvaccinated filling up beds

Well my hospital is definitely having an uptick in number and severity of pediatric covid admissions. It is not nearly as many as adults but still a lot more than we had in 2020.

U.S. Army veteran Daniel Wilkinson, of Texas, died of a treatable illness because the Covid crisis left him without an available ICU bed even though he lives 3 houses down from an emergency room and 60 miles away from some of the greatest healthcare facilities in the world. pic.twitter.com/TK6sOO77ul

— David Begnaud (@DavidBegnaud) August 27, 2021

the idea that you have to be fat or diabetic to get covid pneumonia just isn't true

If yall haven't seen this guy's story. Take note.

https://www.star-telegram.com/news/state/texas/article253786678.html


https://sanangelolive.com/news/san-angelo/2021-08-27/family-confirms-caleb-wallace-has-hours-left-live

Captain Positivity said:

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Oldest person we have in ICU right now is mid 60s. Almost everyone on 40s and 50s. Average age around 51ish.

Crazy.

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More younger people than before or just fewer older?

Wow, I am listening to his doctor describe what happened. Unbelievable and infuriating.

Holy cow.

Here is my raw interview with the doctor. It’s an incredibly gripping and emotional interview. I mainly listened. This man, Dr. Hasan Kakli, is going above and beyond in ways that will make you want to hug the next front line worker you see. Must watch https://t.co/tCuokrtzGP

— David Begnaud (@DavidBegnaud) August 28, 2021

He called Missouri, they were only taking ICU patients for heart attacks.

Austin couldn't get administrative approval to accept him.

Houston would accept him to do the procedure but they had no place to care for him after the surgery so they would have to send him back after.

He accepted their offer, and while waiting for the flight crew the VA hospital in Houston accepted him, they didn't have an ICU bed but they would do the surgery in their ER. This was 5 hours after he arrived and he felt like it was probably too late even if the obstruction surgery was done right then.

By the time he got to the VA hospital he was too near death to even do the procedure. He was put on a vent and an induced coma. His mother had to make the decision to pull the plug.

From a gallstone attack due to lack of care because no space was available.

This doctor had never lost a patient due to a gallstone attack. Normally it takes 30 minutes to get a patient like this to the help they need. In this case it was 7 hours.

Gallstone pancreatitis, progressed to such a degree that he was septic, progressing to septic shock with both hepatic and renal failure. And while there were places that could do the needed procedures (ERCP to remove the stone, then a cholecystecomy), he was in septic shock and needed an ICU bed to provide the critical care needed to (hopefully) turn around.

Served two tours in Afghanistan, then died in Texas because he couldn't get treated
It's truly heartbreaking. How have we come to this?

cc_ag92 said:

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Served two tours in Afghanistan, then died in Texas because he couldn't get treated
It's truly heartbreaking. How have we come to this?

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Social media and government messaging. A bunch of ignorant people posting nonsense about vaccines, and people believing them. If the vaccine acceptance rate among people 20 to 50 was just a few points higher that guy likely lives.

What are we right now, 18 months in to the pandemic in the United States? I can only remember a handful of times any public health official spoke about obesity and the virus. So many young fat people think they are healthy.

Also majorly concerned about the future of healthcare in the hardest hit areas. So many nurses are leaving the profession. A lot of the young nurses especially, they don't have a good background about what normal is. The massive amounts of money being made right now is going to put a strain on the future ability to hire people full time because pay demand is going to be through the roof. And this is at a time where we were already struggling to fill open nursing positions due to a national shortage.

Captain Positivity said:

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cc_ag92 said:

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Served two tours in Afghanistan, then died in Texas because he couldn't get treated
It's truly heartbreaking. How have we come to this?

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Social media and government messaging. A bunch of ignorant people posting nonsense about vaccines, and people believing them. If the vaccine acceptance rate among people 20 to 50 was just a few points higher that guy likely lives.

What are we right now, 18 months in to the pandemic in the United States? I can only remember a handful of times any public health official spoke about obesity and the virus. So many young fat people think they are healthy.

Also majorly concerned about the future of healthcare in the hardest hit areas. So many nurses are leaving the profession. A lot of the young nurses especially, they don't have a good background about what normal is. The massive amounts of money being made right now is going to put a strain on the future ability to hire people full time because pay demand is going to be through the roof. And this is at a time where we were already struggling to fill open nursing positions due to a national shortage.

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Ridiculous. We cry about our dead warfighters when they die overseas, but if only 10 or 20% of the people that cared so much about their right to freedom to decline the "experimental vaccine" decided to get it, this guy would probably still be alive. We don't live in a vacuum. Our choices have effects on other people. The deathrate of the virus isn't the only factor to consider - not only can it cause lasting effects on the individual that gets sick, but it can obviously cause hospitals to fill up and be unable to take easily treatable patients.

Nurses and doctors aren't slaves. Yeah, they're getting paid well, but we're already seeing them leave for less stressful jobs.

This is in the United States of America. I think too many people just assume American exceptionalism and our money will allow us to just magically find or buy our way out of whatever problem we have. Why get a free "experimental vaccine" when you can spend 40,000 on a hospital stay for a more experimental antibody therapy. Why are about the health and wellbeing of nurses and doctors when you can just pay more in insurance premiums down the line to cover the increased pay they'll demand to stay in the profession in the future? Or maybe we'll just do what we did in the past and bring in thousands of immigrant nurses and doctors from Africa and India to help cover the shortage.

Seriously, what have we come to as a society and a country.

Our PICU aid full every day and we are having to board patients in the ED. We had to leave an intubated child in an adult ED while awaiting a bed to open in the PICU. In other words, we are triaging care for children. Yes, it's not entirely COVID but I have been admitting more patients with COVID pneumonia and MISC which places a strain on care for all patients.

30 pediatric COVID admissions. 11 pediatric COVI PICU admissions. 4-5 pediatric COVID ECMO patients. That was Friday.

Of the patients I have admitted, most are previously health but we definitely have patients with underlying health conditions getting sick too. I am not sure of the histories of all admitted patients.

I specialize in pediatric emergency medicine, so I only see children (usually <21yo) except for the few wayward adults who miss read the signs.

We are long past this being a disease of fat, old people. I do not understand the mind set of risking your life when there is an effective preventative medication (vaccine) that has minimal side effects and greatly reduces the severity of disease.

COVID is new. I'm addition to the statin that COVID aid placing on hospitals, we are also seeing the normal illnesses of childhood. RSV is definitely hitting at an odd time of year.

Hard to know what kind of physical specimen a 3 year old will make.

Vaccinations for children are available through clinical trials. Otherwise, 12 and older are free to get vaccinated.