Roy Exum
In Alabama the state’s fire-and-brimstone preachers speak of the “Apocalypse” in the same way they can scare a congregation by dwelling too long on the Book of Revelations. Yet in the center of the Bible Belt at the famed University of Alabama-Birmingham, Dr. Jeannie Marrazzo has just told CNN that the state could be facing a Doomsday-situation in coming weeks; “We are facing a potentially apocalyptic scenario,” she told the TV cameras. And ditto for us in Chattanooga.
I know some are tired of my “COVID porn,” as it is called by the unbelievers, but I am telling any unvaccinated people in the under-vaccinated South that people far smarter and better informed than me believe at the height of this Delta variant this scourge could be tapping on nearly 40 percent of the anti-vaxxers' very shoulders.
And the belief is also by the time Delta is gone it will leave a swath so wide it will make these last 16 months with COVID look like a walk in the park.
You should know there are no intensive care beds in any hospitals in Mississippi, Alabama, Tennessee, Georgia and Florida. To illustrate I am going to use UAB’s numbers where researchers have pin-pointed that as of Wednesday (Aug. 18) there were 2,723 COVID-19 patients in the state, which is overwhelming the hospitals, the doctors and nurses, and the general staffs at every state facility. In Jackson, Miss., they triaged an entire parking deck and now it’s full!
When the apocalypse comes “every hospital (already) is stretched to capacity. Yet public health projections show Alabama will require an estimated 5,000 beds by mid-September. Where will they put people? Where will Nashville or Chattanooga? When a body is admitted to intensive care, it isn’t for a day. A week is more like it. At the COVID peak last winter, the Alabama hospital on one day cared for a record 3,084 patients. This week’s peak, which will likely be tomorrow or Saturday, is easily believed to set a record, with a pressing demand every day
To date, 3,434,499 people in Alabama have been vaccinated and 1,639,032 are fully vaccinated, which is 33.61 percent of the state. (In Tennessee, 6,059,413 have been vaccinated and 2,780,707 are fully vaccinated, which is 41.44 percent of the state.)
According to UAB research, the Delta peak will be in mid-September. “It really looks like we’re going to have surges, where it ebbs and then surges again,” said Dr. Suzanne Judd, but we may be on a path that would take (the state) over 5,000 hospitalizations (in the next several weeks.) That’s twice what today’s groaning point is. And that’s where “potentially apocalyptic” is feared from Mobile to Huntsville to ... in the northeast corner of the state, Chattanooga’s Erlanger Hospital.
The tensile point is what number of cases will be the non-vaccinated. While “breakthrough” infections are occurring to the totally-vaccinated – like Chattanooga Mayor Tim Kelly and Texas Governor Greg Abbott -- the non-vaccinated are requiring hospitalizations and are easily the sickest of the incoming patients. Repeatedly we are urged to “Vaccinate! Vaccinate!” and repeatedly we are seeing what the victims are saying, “Get. The. Damn. Vaccine” … allegedly the last words of a man in Texas this week who leaves a one-year-old son.
Unfortunately, the vaccine by itself isn’t the Holy Grail. No, once a patient receives the vaccine, it is believed it takes about two weeks for the drugs to begin to work into the matrix of the human body. Understand, you are not fully immunized until two weeks after your second “jab” of Moderna or Pfizer vaccine, but the experts are hopeful any vaccine in your body might lessen the symptoms and the severity of the Delta variant.
When I took my third Moderna dose at Publix in Fort Oglethorpe on Wednesday, this because I am among the immuno-compromised, there were several other “third timers.” While there has been an uptake of first timers at the store’s pharmacy, there was little of what I hoped because the Delta variant can indeed be lethal. (Knock on wood, but thus far I have had no ill effects from the third dose.)
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THURSDAY’S NEWS RELEASE FROM THE TENNESSEE HOSPITAL ASSOCIATION
The Tennessee Hospital Association is urging communities to help combat COVID-19. "Every hospital in our state is experiencing capacity issues due to the surge in COVID patients," Wendy Long, MD, CEO of the THA, said in an Aug. 19 statement.
"All ICU beds are currently full in most hospitals in every major metropolitan area of the state," Dr. Long wrote. Several Nashville hospitals are running low on beds, staff, and morale.
From July 1 to Aug. 15, COVID-19 hospitalizations statewide have increased more than 800 percent, from fewer than 300 patients to more than 2,300, according to Dr. Long. The THA is urging more community members to get vaccinated against COVID-19 and wear masks indoors.
Over the past few weeks, vaccination rates in Tennessee have increased, but "it's not enough," according to Dr. Long. "To reduce the strain on our hospital system and prevent more illness and death, more Tennesseans need to get vaccinated."
"Please help ensure there is a bed available for all Tennesseans in their time of need by reducing the spread of COVID by getting vaccinated and wearing a mask in public spaces," Wendy Long added.
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GET THE VACCINE TODAY and take your closest pals with you. There are 7.9 billion people who live in this world and 32 percent of the world population has received at least one dose of a COVID-19 vaccine, and 24 percent is fully vaccinated. 4.84 billion doses have been administered globally, and 34.95 million are now administered each day. (Kinda’ knocks the “conspiracy argument” in the head, don’t you think?)
royexum@aol.com