COVID-19 surge hits Jackson hospitals, health officials say

JACKSON, Tenn. — Health leaders have given constant updates throughout the week on the spike in COVID-19 cases, and just as things started to look like they were getting back to normal.

West Tennessee Healthcare Communications and Compliance Officer Amy Garner says COVID-19 cases are becoming more concerning.

“They just continue to go up every single day. We had 59 hospitalized COVID-patients today. I think we had 53 on Wednesday when I spoke to you,” Garner said.

Garner says two weeks ago there were only five COVID-patients hospitalized. Now they’ve started back, turning the hospital floors into complete isolation units.

“We evaluate every 12 hours what our beds look like and what our COVID census look like, as well as our overall census,” Garner said. “We’ve already started taking action to move COVID-patients to dedicated units like we did before.”

Garner says just as before, hospital staff continue to do screenings and check temperatures on everyone that comes into the facility.

She says they are asking if they have any COVID-related symptoms.

“And if you say ‘yes’ to any of those questions or if you temperature is elevated, we’re isolating you immediately and keeping you away from the general population,” Garner said.

Garner says the spike in cases and hospitalization are primarily people who are not vaccinated.

“And even though there is a risk that you can still get the virus when you’ve been vaccinated, the risk of you being sick enough to be hospitalized or to experience death is very low,” Garner said.

Stay with WBBJ 7 Eyewitness News online and on air for more COVID-19 updates.

Categories: COVID-19 Updates, Local News, News