As COVID-19 vaccinations are accelerating across the United States, a hospital in California that has been hit hard says its staff has achieved herd immunity. In December, when the pandemic was at its peak in the state, UC Davis Medical Center had 231 employees due to COVID-19.
On Wednesday it was only 10.
To date, more than 56 million doses of vaccines have been administered in the United States, although the country is still far from herd immunity scientists, scientists say the country needs to be safe. At UC Davis, however, more than 90% of the staff got at least their first chance – and reached the threshold.
UC Davis nurse Chasity Whitmer gave birth to infants aware of the pandemic. When the time came for her to be vaccinated, she told CBS News’ David Begnaud that she was hesitant.
“If I got the vaccine, would I get COVID? What would be my side effects? How long would it take? “Remember Whitmer and wonder.
But with a man staying at home and caring for the children, Whitmer told CBS News what changed her mind.
“I directed a nurse to my unit and we had a discussion,” she said. “What happens if we get COVID? We would not be able to work. We would not have had an income, and no health insurance. And so we just talked to each other and increased our confidence and in line to get vaccinated. to become. ‘
She and more than 90% of the staff at UC Davis Medical Center in Sacramento received at least one dose of the vaccine.
The number is 100% among the emergency physicians of the hospital, says dr. Nate Kuppermann, director of the emergency department.
Kuppermann said the vaccination of the majority of employees has changed his ability to man the ER, and that it feels like ‘this pressure is being lifted from our shoulders’.
“Before the vaccine came out, on a given day we would have had between 100 and 150 employees who were sick with COVID and who were sick who did not come in,” he said. “And now I think it’s single digits. I mean, there’s less than 10.”
It’s not just UC Davis’ health care system – in the University of California’s health care system, cases among health care workers have dropped from 431 a week to 171 a week. With less sick staff, the stress on health workers has also decreased.
Interim Director of Employee Health Services, Anne Tompkins, said the UC Davis data and the stories of people “are proof that the vaccine actually works.”
“We’re going to get better,” she said.
As for Whitmer, the nurse switched from a vaccine skeptic to an evangelist – a few days after receiving her second dose, Whitmer’s husband, mother, three children and grandmother all tested positive for COVID-19. Only she and her grandfather did not – and are the only two in the family to be vaccinated.
“My husband was very sick with COVID pneumonia, was here nine hours at the emergency. My grandmother spent 25 days in the hospital with COVID pneumonia and is still recovering with oxygen,” Whitmer said. “It’s not nice to see your family members sick. It’s very scary, to be a nurse, to see how they get sicker and sicker and whether they have to go to the hospital or stay at home.”
Whitmer said it made her emotional by reliving it because she did not know if her husband would be the one who would live. or die.“
One member of the CBS News team that shot video in UC Davis said it was the calmest and quietest hospital he had visited in months.
And while the staff there are confident that they are all protected by the vaccine, they should take off masks and social distances at all times.