BREAKING: Hospitals pull plug on field hospital
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Atrium and Novant say overflow hospital is not needed; improved projections, more internal space cited
Less than two weeks after saying they urgently needed a 3,000-bed field hospital to accommodate an anticipated surge in coronavirus cases, Atrium Health and Novant Health said on Wednesday that no such facility is needed.
According to a letter released Wednesday by the county, the CEOs of Charlotte’s hospital systems say they “are seeing a flattening of the curve” and that they are adding enough beds at their facilities to meet the projected needs.
On April 2, the hospitals reported that they needed 3,000 beds inside dorms at UNC Charlotte. At the time, The Ledger reported that such a hospital would be among the biggest such facilities in the country. County Manager Deno Diorio said on April 3: “The need for those 3,000 beds appears pretty likely.”
Four days later, the hospital systems reduced the request to just 600 beds. Diorio told commissioners on Tuesday that if the hospitals needed it, the facility would be built inside the Charlotte Convention Center.
Not needed: The letter, dated Wednesday, canceled the request altogether. It comes as Mecklenburg County has been reporting fewer daily cases in the last week. Nonetheless, county officials said Tuesday that they are forecasting a surge in coronavirus cases that peaks in early June and overwhelms local healthcare resources.
The hospitals said their projections show a slowing of the number of confirmed cases: “Instead of positive cases doubling every 2.85 days, as they were previously, the current trajectory is showing positive cases now doubling every six days.”
The CEOs wrote that they believe social distancing should continue:
As a result of our combined efforts, we believe we are now in position to meet the 600 medical beds needed that were previously requested in a field hospital, assuming the effects of social distancing trend continues the current trajectory.
They also thanked the community “for the phenomenal, overall support of [the] stay-at-home directive. It is making a big difference and a true demonstration of who we can be at our best.”
In a statement released by the county, health director Gibbie Harris said the cancellation of the planned field hospital proves the “stay at home” order is working.
“We are obviously pleased, but we can’t stop now,” she said. “We have to continue the compliance, flatten the curve, and get beyond this.”
Read the full Atrium and Novant letter here.
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Executive editor: Tony Mecia; Managing editor: Cristina Bolling; Contributing editor: Tim Whitmire; Reporting intern: David Griffith
Based on our county leadership's own data and their forecast model, they should have immediately built the field hospital as soon as FEMA agreed to pay for it and then begun re-opening our economy. All the extreme social distancing measures do is delay the spread of the disease, i.e. "flattening the curve." They do not reduce the numbers of people who will ultimately become infected or how many will require hospitalization or the number of fatalities. If there is no risk of exceeding the capacity of our healthcare system, there is no justification for the incredible economic damage being done, both to our economy as a whole and to so many of our individual citizens and families. Our officials say they are making decisions based on data and science, but they obviously are not. Economics is also a science; politics are not.