Government Providing Additional Beds For COVID-19 Patients

The Government is quickly moving to provide additional bed space for the increasing number of patients with coronavirus (COVID-19) who require hospitalisation.

This was disclosed by Minister of Health and Wellness, Dr. the Hon. Christopher Tufton, who said this has become necessary, especially given that, in the last week, the country added 2,818 new COVID-19 cases and saw hospitalisations move from 245 to 270 COVID-19 positive patients.

“The present state of hospitalisation has become for us alarmingly high. We have, currently, some 13 of 22 hospitals across the island at the red alert phase, which means that they have a greater than 84 per cent occupancy level for its isolation capacity. Nine of these hospitals are at 100 per cent or greater capacity,” he said.

The Minister was speaking at the virtual COVID Conversations press briefing, at the Ministry’s office in New Kingston, on Tuesday (February 23).

Dr. Tufton stressed that the increase in the number of COVID-19 cases in the country remains a cause for concern, noting that the increase means more active cases require management by the health team, resulting in more stress on the health infrastructure and on the health team.

“A portion of these active cases would require monitoring in hospitals and so a rise in hospitalisation of COVID-19 cases or patients is a reality and it is adding to the burden on an already overburdened infrastructure and clinical team,” he said.

The Minister said that in order to address the increased hospitalisations and the demand for general care on the public health system, the Government has made arrangements with several hospitals to provide more bed spaces.

Dr. Tufton noted that in addition to the 72 beds that are to be provided through the soon-to-be-deployed field hospitals, an additional 45 beds are to be provided at the National Chest Hospital and the University Hospital of the West Indies (UHWI).

“I visited the National Chest Hospital yesterday. Their COVID ward was 100 per cent taken up – 36 beds. They are now adding an additional 20 beds. We are providing for them additional infrastructure to support that as well as at the UHWI, where I again visited yesterday. They are converting an existing ward for general usage, which contains some 25 beds, to being an additional COVID ward,” he said, adding that the UHWI was also at full capacity with 41 beds.

Dr. Tufton informed that the Health and Wellness Ministry had initiated an arrangement with the Andrews Memorial Hospital for the accommodation of overflow of non-COVID patients.

“It will take some of the non-COVID patients out of the public health system, and so create space for patients who require COVID care in the public health system,” he noted.

Turning to the four field hospitals being built to further increase the public health system’s capacity, Dr. Tufton informed that he visited the Falmouth Public General Hospital in Trelawny, and the St. Joseph’s Hospital and Medical Centre in Kingston last week “and they are pretty much complete and are now being prepared in terms of the internal infrastructure and staffing”.

The other facility is being housed at the Mandeville Regional Hospital in Manchester; while the 40-bed field hospital that was originally sited at the National Chest Hospital is being moved to Spanish Town.

Dr. Tufton said that through these various arrangements, the Government is adding “a significant number of additional beds to support the overflow that is now taking place”.