Kansas doctors plead for you to take COVID precautions as people die waiting for care at hospitals

WICHITA, Kansas — Health care officials across Kansas and Missouri issued a dire warning Wednesday that COVID-19 has reached new and alarming crisis levels throughout the region.

Hospitals struggling to care for sick coronavirus patients — the vast majority of them unvaccinated — find themselves short on staff after record numbers of health care workers are testing positive for the virus.

More people are dying in emergency rooms while waiting for care, doctors said. Non-critical surgeries and other procedures are being postponed. And more sick patients, including increasing numbers of children, wait hours or even days for hospital beds.

“This is, hands down, the toughest surge the medical community has had to face since the pandemic began in 2020,” said Dr. Steven Stites, chief medical officer at the University of Kansas Health System in Kansas City. “We are in crisis, and … it’s shocking to me that people want to declare victory when we’re at this point.”

Read more: https://www.kmuw.org/2022-01-05/kansas-doctors-plead-for-you-to-take-covid-precautions-as-people-die-waiting-for-care-at-hospitals