DeSantis Says Florida Has a COVID-19 ‘Blip.’ Nurses Say It’s Far Worse. https://www.thedailybeast.com/gov-r...-has-a-covid-19-blip-nurses-say-its-far-worse Hospitals across Florida are in the thick of New York-level chaos, and health-care workers believe the worst is yet to come. MIAMI—At the epicenter of the coronavirus outbreak in the United States and the world, physicians and nurses in Florida’s besieged health care system are struggling to keep up with a tidal wave of new cases. Despite what their Republican governor keeps saying, nothing about what they’re experiencing seems run-of-the-mill or likely to improve any time soon. If anything, experts and medical workers in the state say, the worst is yet to come. “The past two weeks [have] been crazier than at the beginning of the pandemic,” a nurse at Memorial Hospital West in Pembroke Pines outside Miami, who requested anonymity because she had not received authorization from her hospital to speak to the press, told The Daily Beast. “Everybody is exhausted. I have never seen it like that before.” One of the earliest states to loosen coronavirus restrictions, Florida has been shattering virus records daily for the past few weeks. The Florida Department of Health on Monday reported at least 12,624 new cases, taking total infections to 282,435. While the numbers marked a decrease from Sunday, where the Sunshine State recorded 15,300 new cases—more than all of Europe—they still indicate the infection rate is dire, as dozens of the state’s intensive care units are at capacity. On Saturday, the state’s positivity rate, or the percentage of COVID-19 tests coming back positive, was at 11.25 percent—a 56 percent increase from just one month ago. But while the medical community has raised alarm bells that Florida’s hospitals are overwhelmed, understaffed, and short on supplies, some state officials are doing their best to downplay the problem. During a Friday press briefing, Gov. Ron DeSantis tried to assuage fears over the record-breaking infection and hospitalization rates by claiming busy hospitals are common in the Sunshine State. “We’ve got the census today. I think between 10 and 12 or 13,000—somewhere like that—beds are available,” DeSantis said, referring to the state belatedly releasing county-by-county hospitalization numbers. “There’ll be articles saying, ‘Oh, my gosh. They’re at 90 percent.’ Well, that’s how hospitals normally run.” Characterizing the surge of COVID-19 new cases as a “blip,” the Republican also noted that Florida has had “a lot of different blips.” We’re now at a higher blip than where we were in May and the beginning of June,” he added. Frontline medical workers and experts in the state paint a much darker picture. On Friday, Memorial Hospital West hospital CEO Leah Carpenter told a local television station that her facility had experienced a massive increase in emergency room visits over the previous three days. “Our hospital capacity is at about 89 percent,” Carpenter told WSVN. “Our ICU capacity is beyond 100 percent.” By Monday, Carpenter was not available to do media interviews because she had to pitch in and help with the patient overload, according to Memorial Hospital West spokesman Stu Oppenheimer. “While Leah is the CEO at Memorial Hospital West, she is also a nurse and currently taking shifts in the hospital during the surge, so she is also unavailable to us for the time being,” Oppenheimer said. “Our frontline workers are all incredibly busy with the current COVID-19 surge.” The state Agency for Health Care Administration’s latest update on hospitalizations showed the number of available beds shrinking drastically: As of Friday, the day statewide hospitalization numbers went public, at least 52 Florida hospitals had no ICU capacity left at all. In Broward, the county with the second-highest number of positive cases and where Memorial Hospital West is located, over 81 percent of beds had been used as of Monday. The hospital only had 50 beds left available, while two other Broward hospitals had none. Intensive care unit beds were even more scarce. Memorial Hospital West had two adult ICU beds left out of 34 and two sister hospitals had no adult ICU beds available. Seven other Broward hospitals also had no adult ICU beds left. The entire state only had 1,151 available adult ICU beds, or 18.7 percent of the total 6,150 adult ICU beds in Florida, according to the Agency for Health Care Administration. Rebekah Jones, the former Florida health department geographer who created the state’s COVID-19 dashboard and who claims she was fired for refusing to manipulate data, told The Daily Beast she was not surprised to see the recent surges because of DeSantis’ “premature push to reopen the state in May.” “Hospital staff have the hardest job in the world right now, more so than any of us scientists," she said. “That most hospitals in Florida are at or near capacity frightens me. It should frighten everyone.” To combat the massive increase and lack of space in the emergency room, the Memorial West nurse told The Daily Beast, the hospital staff started to treat patients in the hallways. Or at least they did the last time she was in: The nurse has not been at work since testing positive for the virus and being sent home to quarantine. But she’s been getting regular updates about the chaos inside the hospital near Hollywood, Florida, from a group chat thread with colleagues. “I know it is still crazy because of what they are saying in the chat,” the nurse said, stating that colleagues have indicated the surge doesn’t show any signs of abating. “The hospital is paying for overtime shifts and they are hiring a lot of agency nurses and traveling nurses. I am scared about going back.” The nurse, who said at least four other nurses at that hospital were in quarantine after contracting COVID-19, added, “You discharge one patient and the next one comes right in. If more nurses have to go into quarantine, we will be understaffed.” (Oppenheimer did not immediately respond to follow-up questions for this story.) Florida is one of several U.S. states at a tipping point months after re-opening their economies. It also stands out for not issuing aggressive face-mask mandates at the state level, in contrast even to conservative bastions like Texas. Last week, the Harvard Global Health Institute recommended a number of states, including Florida, Georgia, Arizona, Louisiana, and South Carolina, institute a mandatory stay-at-home order to curtail severe outbreaks. And while those five states have been hit the hardest, Harvard suggested that 15 other states should weigh the possibility of a second shutdown. A New York Times study of the number of daily infections between June 28 and July 5 showed how dire the United States’ uptick was compared to the rest of the world. Arizona and Florida were the two most affected areas on the planet—followed by South Carolina, the country of Bahrain, and Louisiana. Cleveland Clinic Florida, a hospital in Weston, a city neighboring Pembroke Pines, is also feeling the massive impact of the COVID-19 surge. The number of people visiting the ER with virus symptoms has contributed to a dramatic increase in daily patient loads, according to a Cleveland Clinic nurse who also spoke on condition of anonymity because he did not have permission to speak to the media. “Counting [COVID and] non-COVID patients, we went from seeing 100 people to 200 people a day,” the nurse said. “That is how many come in to get checked.” According to the Agency for Health Care Administration, as of Monday, Cleveland Clinic had 25 available beds, of which nine were for adult ICU patients. The nurse said he worked on a 72-year-old patient over the weekend who had to be placed on a ventilator. “We had to do CPR on him,” the nurse said. “The 911 call came in as shortness of breath. But by the time he got to the hospital, he wasn’t breathing at all.” Like Memorial West, Cleveland Clinic is offering overtime shifts to ER nurses, who typically work three 12-hour shifts a week, the nurse said. “Some nurses are now working five days a week picking up two extra shifts,” he said. “We are constantly getting text messages asking if we want extra hours.” A Cleveland Clinic spokesperson acknowledged the hospital had experienced an increase in the number of patients coming to the ER with COVID-19 symptoms. “Most patients do not require admission and are discharged and asked to quarantine at home,” the spokesperson said. “We continue to monitor the fluctuation of COVID-19 cases on a day-to-day basis… We evaluate our staffing needs on a daily basis and have the ability to supplement staffing as needed, which has included the use of contracted nurses.” Likewise, a paramedic who works in Aventura Hospital about 20 minutes outside of Fort Lauderdale—who also requested anonymity for fear of professional retaliation—said his workplace had 70 confirmed COVID-19 patients admitted as of Friday, the day of his most recent shift. “That doesn’t include the confirmed cases that were discharged or the ones still waiting for positive results,” the paramedic said. “The ICU was definitely pretty packed when I was there.” In addition, the paramedic said, there were two days last week when Aventura wasn’t receiving new patients and instructed paramedics to send them to the next nearest hospital. A spokesperson for Aventura did not respond to a request for comment on Monday. According to the Agency for Health Care Administration, Aventura Hospital has 33 available beds left, of which seven are for adult ICU patients. Overall, Miami-Dade hospitals have reached 80 percent bed capacity. “I’ve been there for six years and there’s never been a diversion of patients,” the paramedic said. “That’s how crazy busy we are. That shows you how big of an impact COVID is having.” DeSantis’ office did not respond to The Daily Beast’s request for comment on Monday. But during an evening press conference, the Republican stressed that despite increased positivity rates, Florida was not comparable to other hotspots, like New York. “That’s just generating cases that are not clinically consequential but important to know,” DeSantis said Monday, suggesting the increased testing numbers amounted to little more than a backlog of information. Still, earlier on Monday, one of the same officials who appeared with DeSantis warned South Florida was entering a catastrophic phase of the pandemic. Carlos Migoya, president and CEO of Jackson Health System in Miami-Dade, said the peak was still another two to three weeks away. “You have people who are aggressively saying they don't have to wear a mask and don’t have to do social distancing,” he explained. “Those are the kind of people spreading this disease. If we don’t get this under control and have too many more infections, we are going to have problems.” “Every health-care worker is working nonstop,” added Lilian Abbo, a University of Miami Health System infectious disease physician. “Our workforce is also falling sick and they are getting infected in the community.” Abbo said too many residents were simply ignoring safety measures—such as wearing masks, social distancing and staying at home—that are now more important than ever. “Miami is now the epicenter of the pandemic,” Abbo said. “What we were seeing in Wuhan months ago, we are there now.”
The question is has DeSantis dug such a big hole for himself he can never ever admit there is a problem or situation with Covid 19 to the detriment of his citizens...his head is so far in the sand that if COVID becomes a real escalating issue for Florida were it gets out of control, he can never do anything for fear of looking like an ass.
I am afraid that is the issue with DeSantis. He keeps doubling down on his stupidity over and over again. This can be seen in his inane statements to the media ("It's just a blip"). At least some other governors demonstrated they can change course when presented with the facts (such as Abbott in Texas).
Miami is now the coronavirus epicenter as cases surge, expert says https://www.cnn.com/2020/07/14/health/us-coronavirus-tuesday/index.html With more than 2,000 patients hospitalized and hundreds in Intensive Care Units, "Miami is now the epicenter of the pandemic," one infectious disease expert said, comparing theSouth Florida metropolitan area to the city where the pandemic originated. "What we were seeing in Wuhan -- six months ago, five months ago -- now we are there," Lilian Abbo, with the Jackson Health System said during a news conference hosted Monday by the Miami-Dade County mayor. The Chinese city of Wuhan, the original epicenter of the coronavirus crisis, went into a 76-day lockdown in late January after a deadly outbreak infected and killed thousands. The first known cases of the virus were detected in the city in December and by mid-April officials reported more than 50,000 infections. Miami-Dade County has recorded more than 64,000 infections so far, according to state data. In the past 13 days, Miami-Dade County has seen staggering increases in the number of Covid-19 patients being hospitalized (68%), in the number of ICU beds being used (69%) and in the use of ventilators (109%), the Miami-Dade County Government reported. Forty-eight Florida hospitals, including eight in Miami-Dade, have reached their ICU capacity, according to the Agency for Health Care Administration. "We need your help as media communicators to help the community understand that we're just not repeating the same thing over and over just to give you trouble, we really need your help," Abbo said, directing those comments to reporters. The plea echos the requests fromother leaders in the state and across the country who have seen new cases spike as people flocked back outside following weeks of lockdowns. (More at above url)
How is that Florida real-estate doing? Home prices in Florida and Arizona expected to drop due to COVID-19 “perfect storm” | 7/13/2020 Home prices in Florida and Arizona expected to drop due to COVID-19 “perfect storm” https://www.floridatrend.com/articl...xpected-to-drop-due-to-covid-19-perfect-storm Despite home prices increasing 4.8% year over year in May, a report by CoreLogic predicts home prices will stall over the summer and estimates a 6.6% decline by May of 2021. “States like Arizona and Florida faced the perfect storm of elevated COVID-19 cases and the subsequent collapse of the spring and summer tourism market, which curtailed home-purchase demand enough to keep a lid on home price gains over the coming year,” CoreLogic said. More from Housing Wire and Barron's.
Let's see what the Sun Sentinel has to say about DeSantis in late June.... and the situation keeps on getting worse. I can only assume that these other thread would take this as an example of "DeSantis is winning". DeSantis a serial fabricator on COVID-19 surge https://www.sun-sentinel.com/opinio...0200623-w6iu3f6zt5dple7ecljjwfr3za-story.html If Gov. Ron DeSantis wants Florida to recover from COVID-19 as quickly as possible, he should stop lying about the rise in COVID-19 cases. As the state set records last week, DeSantis tried to wish away the numbers. The cause, he said, was increased testing. There was a cluster at Orlando International Airport and others among farmworkers living in crowded conditions. In fact, multiple reports confirmed that the increase in cases far outstripped the increase in testing. DeSantis now has conceded that he lied. In addition, the Orlando International Airport CEO pointed out that only two of 500 county airport employees had tested positive last week. If you consider the roughly 22,000 “badged employees” who work at the airport, the positive test rate is 0.6 percent over the last two-plus months. There went another DeSantis excuse. The governor’s office responded that his information “should have been presented more clearly.” As for blaming “overwhelmingly Hispanic” farmworkers, to use the governor’s phrasing, public health experts also pushed back on that. Harvest season in Florida ended weeks ago. This new surge resulted mostly from people going out over Memorial Day weekend and failing to social distance and wear masks. As DeSantis flailed last week, one of his allies tried to help. The Florida Chamber of Commerce touted its poll in which 57 percent of voters approved of the governor’s COVID-19 response against 39 percent who didn’t. The chamber is as close to a shadow government as there is in Florida. Yet even what amounts to an in-house poll for DeSantis produced underwhelming support. Another Republican governor, Mike DeWine of Ohio, regularly has had approval ratings in the mid-80s for his steady, transparent handling of that state’s response. In contrast, DeSantis too often sounds like the mayor in “Jaws,” telling people to ignore that dorsal fin in the water. That’s because DeSantis takes every cue from the White House. So he dutifully parroted Vice President Mike Pence, who advised governors to cite testing for any “marginal” rise in new cases. This is the same Mike Pence who on April 23 said, “I think by Memorial Day weekend, we will largely have this coronavirus epidemic behind us.” The White House now is preparing for a new wave in the fall. Models show the country reaching 200,000 deaths in October, almost double from when Pence claimed victory. To help President Trump win Florida, DeSantis wants to portray the state as recovering strongly from COVID-19 lockdowns. “We’re not rolling back,” he vowed last week. The governor, though, got two hard reminders last week that economic recovery depends on public health. Apple announced that it would re-close 11 stores because of the renewed outbreaks. Two are in Florida. Others are in Arizona, which also has rushed to reopen under the Trump script. Apple’s news caused the Dow to drop 600 points. Then National Basketball Association players began expressing concern about the Disney World “bubble.” They are supposed to remain in it from late July until October while playing games at ESPN’s Wide World of Sports complex to determine the league champion after COVID-19 stopped the regular season in mid-March. In addition, one Major League Baseball team closed its Florida camp after players tested positive. So did the Tampa Bay Lightning of the National Hockey League. Last month, DeSantis touted Florida as a haven for sports from virus-plagued states. With reopened theme parks, the sight of big-name athletes playing in Florida, DeSantis said, would help get back the state’s “mojo.” Rather than worry about “mojo” and stay hands-off, DeSantis should worry that his actions are undercutting his argument against “rolling back.” DeSantis fired the creator of the state’s COVID-19 dashboard after she accused his administration of cooking the books. Now DeSantis wants hospitals to undercount intensive care patients, which could make hospital ICU capacity look artificially high as the virus spreads. The pandemic response playbook, which Barack Obama developed and Donald Trump trashed, begins with giving the public regular, reliable information. DeSantis had ignored that guidance long before he lied about the cause of the recent surge. In trying to please Trump, DeSantis is failing Florida.
"DeSantis for the win" Not content to merely fudge the data - DeSantis is now blocking mayors of major cities from attending COVID meetings. Mayor of Hialeah says DeSantis refused to let him into meeting to discuss COVID-19 https://www.miamiherald.com/news/politics-government/state-politics/article244218502.html The mayor of Hialeah, the second-largest city in Miami-Dade County, said Tuesday that he was denied entry to a roundtable that Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis held with several city mayors to discuss the COVID-19 pandemic. DeSantis announced plans Tuesday morning for the 1 p.m. in-person roundtable at the Stephen P. Clark Government Center in downtown Miami, and members of his staff contacted the mayors of several cities in Miami-Dade County to invite them to the meeting. Hialeah Mayor Carlos Hernandez said he didn’t receive an invitation, but Miami Mayor Francis Suarez informed him the roundtable was taking place. When Hernandez tried to walk in, he told the Miami Herald, a member of the governor’s staff told him he wasn’t invited and couldn’t enter. “I think it’s childish on behalf of the governor to not invite the mayor of the sixth-largest city in the state and the second-largest city in the county,” Hernandez said. “It’s a lack of respect to the citizens of Hialeah.” Hernandez has been critical of DeSantis’ response to the pandemic. Last month, after the governor mentioned Hialeah as a city with a high rate of positive coronavirus tests, Hernandezshot backthat his city has received “no help” from the governor. “If he’s got a personal issue with me, I don’t know,” Hernandez said Tuesday. “It shows that he’s a spoiled child.” The roundtable featured DeSantis, Miami-Dade County Mayor Carlos Gimenez, and the mayors of six cities: Miami, Miami Gardens and Miami Beach — the first-, third- and fourth-largest cities in the county by population — as well as Doral, Pinecrest and Bal Harbour. After the roundtable concluded, DeSantis said in response to a reporter’s question that he didn’t know why the Hialeah mayor hadn’t been invited. “I wasn’t personally the one that invited the folks,” DeSantis said, adding that he would be “happy to meet with” Hernandez. “Hialeah is a great town,” he said. “I know they’ve had a tough go with this outbreak for a long time.” In a press release, Hernandez criticized not only DeSantis but also Gimenez, the county mayor. The roundtable was held in the county’s government center. “There is no justification for what occurred today and even less so by the mayor of Miami-Dade County, Carlos Gimenez, that allowed for this to happen, in his office,” Hernandez said. “The inferiority complex of both these elected officials overpowers any intent that they may have to save their community.” A spokeswoman for Gimenez, Patty Abril, told the Herald the governor’s staff decided on the invitations. “It’s more a question for DeSantis’ staff, but I believe the intention was to have a cross-section of municipalities, both large and small,” Abril said in an email. “Mayor Gimenez was asked to provide the space for the meeting late yesterday.” DeSantis spokeswoman Helen Aguirre Ferré did not respond to a request for comment. Hernandez, like DeSantis and Gimenez, is a registered Republican, though his mayoral seat is non-partisan. Tuesday afternoon, Hialeah City Council President Paul Hernandez said “not providing Hialeah a seat at the table of this very pressing conversation is a grave error. “For these reasons, as council president, I would like to extend an invitation to Governor Ron DeSantis to meet with the entire City Council in Hialeah in order to have an honest conversation about COVID-19’s effects, government response, and future mitigation options as they pertain to Hialeah,” the council president said. The largely working-class community of Hialeah is among the hardest-hit in the state by the pandemic, with 9,800 cases reported as of Tuesday, according to the state’s daily COVID-19 report. Hialeah is the largest majority-Hispanic community in Florida, and its foreign-born population is among the highest for any city in the United States. Of that population, 82% are Cuban-American. The mayor of Bal Harbour, a seaside village of about 2,500 residents, attended Tuesday’s roundtable. According to Tuesday’s state report, the village has had 28 confirmed cases of COVID-19.