As COVID-19 cases continue to increase throughout the Bay, some of the largest spikes are in southern Santa Clara County.
Gilroy’s only hospital is struggling to keep up with demand and on Monday community leaders sounded the alarm and tried to explain the increase – while pleading with people to double efforts to prevent the spread.
At Saint Louise Regional Hospital in Gilroy, the ICU was full and had to transport an average of one to two patients a day to other hospitals.
“We have started canceling elective surgeries, so the nurses from our surgery department are now being deployed to assist in the ICU, the emergency department and medicine,” Gloria dela Merced said.
But that’s not enough, with the ICU full, transfers to other hospitals have become a daily occurrence – sometimes it’s even necessary to move to another country. While some subacute patients are now being transferred here to the De Paul Health Center in Morgan Hill.
“It really helps to unload the patients who are stable enough to be discharged but not go home,” Merced said.
Gilroy and Morgan Hill have more cases than almost anywhere else in the country, which is why beds are filling up fast. But why?
‘We know that there are different factors that play a role in the large number of cases, one is density, the number of people in the population living together in a small space, and the other is theirs and the percentage of the population that is essential do work, ”said Maribel Martinez, public information officer in Santa Clara County.
And although only a quarter of the entire country’s population is Latino, it accounts for almost 52% of all the provinces’ effects.
Therefore, leaders in the community’s health in Spanish and English sounded the alarm and encouraged people in the region to stay home on New Year’s Eve and wear masks.