Abbott:

25,483 Texans tested for COVID19
Of those tested, 2,552 confirmed positive
118 counties where someone tested positive
176 people in hospitals who have tested positive
34 fatalities connected to COVID19 (when I say connection, people who may have COVID19 but also a host of other medical ailments)

On average, less than 10% people who were tested test positive; 90% people who tested for COVID19 test negative
Of people who are tested, less than 10% who test positive are going to hospitals; 90% people who test positive are not needing to go to a hospital
Most of these numbers are results of personal interactions before distancing practices

Number of hospital beds available for COVID19 positive patients doubled
March 18: 8,100 hospital beds for COVID19
March 26: 16,000 beds for COVID19 patients
Increase does not include increased potential occupancy rooms as a result of my other EO requiring the doubling of beds in rooms capable of having two beds
Number of available beds and rooms should be even larger than the number provided today

Number of Texans hospitalized with connection to COVID19 is less than 2% of available hospital room capacity; COVID hospital vacancy rate of 98%
Plenty of hospital capacity for COVID19 today

Existing hospitals will continue to be primary location for those in need

Kay Bailey Hutchison Convention Center in Dallas will be set up to expand healthcare facilities
As we gather today, in the KBHCC, already large scale medical kits & equipment that exists
Capacity for 250 beds with plenty of room to massively expand that number if needed

Additional executive orders:
Massive spread in New Orleans/Louisiana
Prior EO about travel from New Orleans covered air travel; Updating EO to also include travel by road from any location in the State of Louisiana; does not apply to commercial activity, military service, emergency/health response, critical infrastructure functions

Expanding EO requiring quarantine of passengers flying into Texas to include more locations: Miami, FL; Atlanta, GA; Detroit, MI; Chicago, IL; any air travel from CA and Washington State

Issuing EO to stop the release of dangerous felons from prisons & jails in Texas. Releasing dangerous criminals is not the right solution. Doing so now is prohibited by law.

Excellent update!

The lack of testing is a huge gamble. I hope he is right because the way he has handled this it could blow up around all of us if he is wrong.

The one down side here is that as all of those hospital beds remain empty, the hospitals are not able to bill for them...

If they can't bill for the beds, hospital workers stop getting paid...

Walking a dangerous line here...

FireAg said:

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The one down side here is that as all of those hospital beds remain empty, the hospitals are not able to bill for them...

If they can't bill for the beds, hospital workers stop getting paid...

Walking a dangerous line here...

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They've been doing just fine for years before this was even an issue. Plenty of other problems they have to bill for.....

And lets be honest, the medical industry will get any bailout it really needs in this crisis.

mts6175 said:

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FireAg said:

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The one down side here is that as all of those hospital beds remain empty, the hospitals are not able to bill for them...

If they can't bill for the beds, hospital workers stop getting paid...

Walking a dangerous line here...

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They've been doing just fine for years before this was even an issue. Plenty of other problems they have to bill for.....

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Except all elective procedures have been shut down...

And hardly anyone is going into ERs now...

Trust me when I say that the Houston medical community is in bad shape financially...

Both major systems in Houston are going to reduced work hours starting tomorrow trying to avoid furloughs and layoffs...

Exactly.

Hospitals are like airlines. If an airplane seat is empty, the airline is losing money. Similarly, if a hospital room is empty, the hospital is losing money. Hospital management expects a very high utilization percentage to balance the books. And they usually get that between routine care and elective procedures. But now that's all been axed.

So almost all hospital rooms are empty. The hospitals are running massively in the red.

I can attest to the above . I work at a coummunity hospital in Houston and we have no covid patients . We have had low census the past week and a half . We are all flexing hours , leaving early or taking days off , etc . It is concerning from an employment standpoint.

I am a dentist and for some reason we are included in the " elective procedure" ban. Sent a lot of ladies home for a month and just seeing sporadic " emergencies ". We are going to be able to hang on til April 21 but not much more after that if he extends it. Seems asinine that people not getting their teeth cleaned is freeing up hospital beds but whatever.

Believe that has more to do with limiting spread, no? Being that dentistry is pretty much the best way to aerosolize and spread this virus. But yes, dentist, along with plenty of other small businesses are going to be crushed by this.

I know, my wife is a dentist.

I empathize with the lighter hours and smaller paychecks that healthcare professionals are experiencing. But take it with the grain of salt how many businesses are completely shut down and their owners are in week 2 of making $0 per day. Good friend of mine owns a bowling alley in houston. Aint no work from home on that job. We have all gotten so used to doing whatever we want whenever we want that we've forgotten what it feeld like to tighten the belt a couple of notches past our comfort zone.

Texas started getting the word out about social distancing before it started spreading like crazy here and people seem to have taken it more seriously, thankfully. It's obviously pretty difficult to prove a negative in terms of what might have been had we done nothing, but I would take Texas' position over Louisiana or New York any day. However, I would caution that lack of testing may give people a false level of confidence that the virus isn't as bad as what we think. For whatever reason Texas seems to have a high false negative rate. We intubated three more people yesterday with signs / symptoms of viral pneumonia, one of which previously tested negative and the other two still had tests pending. The testing is the most frustrating part of all of this.

That being said, hospitals in Texas are prepping for a big increase that we hope never comes and the executive order banning elective procedures should have never happened. It should have been up to the local level. Our same day surgery crews, OR staff, and one of our nursing units are all being reassigned as possible or on furlough. We've also reduced hours for lab personnel, dietary, and have cancelled every person working under a temporary contract. Just a month ago we were offering five-figure bonuses for new nurse hires because we were so desperate for staff. Now we are in a hiring freeze. If this lasts for another month there will likely be layoffs.

I had 3 bad shifts in a row of almost nothing but COVID, but that seems to have slowed. The last 2 shifts I've seen a total of 1 possible COVID patient. I'm hoping that trend continues.

Dr. Not Yet Dr. Ag said:

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I had 3 bad shifts in a row of almost nothing but COVID, but that seems to have slowed. The last 2 shifts I've seen a total of 1 possible COVID patient. I'm hoping that trend continues.

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PneumAg said:

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FireAg said:

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The one down side here is that as all of those hospital beds remain empty, the hospitals are not able to bill for them...

If they can't bill for the beds, hospital workers stop getting paid...

Walking a dangerous line here...

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Wasn't everybody on this board predicting mass annihilation and hospital overflows two weeks ago? Now we're worried because hospitals aren't busy enough?

Gee, maybe we shouldn't have shut down all of our major cities, steered people away from ERs and other doctor visits, and banned elective medical procedures, all for a virus that almost nobody in this state even has. What a joke.

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The medical industry was happy to bankrupt everyone until their bottom line is hurt.

The hospital will make it all back with some bogus random charges to the insurance company.

Moxley said:

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Texas started getting the word out about social distancing before it started spreading like crazy here and people seem to have taken it more seriously, thankfully. It's obviously pretty difficult to prove a negative in terms of what might have been had we done nothing, but I would take Texas' position over Louisiana or New York any day. However, I would caution that lack of testing may give people a false level of confidence that the virus isn't as bad as what we think. For whatever reason Texas seems to have a high false negative rate. We intubated three more people yesterday with signs / symptoms of viral pneumonia, one of which previously tested negative and the other two still had tests pending. The testing is the most frustrating part of all of this.

That being said, hospitals in Texas are prepping for a big increase that we hope never comes and the executive order banning elective procedures should have never happened. It should have been up to the local level. Our same day surgery crews, OR staff, and one of our nursing units are all being reassigned as possible or on furlough. We've also reduced hours for lab personnel, dietary, and have cancelled every person working under a temporary contract. Just a month ago we were offering five-figure bonuses for new nurse hires because we were so desperate for staff. Now we are in a hiring freeze. If this lasts for another month there will likely be layoffs.

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Lack of testing isn't giving us any false hope. Hospitals are not overrun, and that's what was confidently predicted by many doctors two weeks ago. As long as hospitals still have capacity, testing numbers do not matter. I have six doctors in my immediate and extended family, and every one of them was going crazy sending out text messages and emails telling people to stay in their homes, prepare for mass deaths, this is going to be the worst thing we've ever seen, we're getting ready to go to war, we need a nationwide shutdown, etc.

Doctors are qualified to do the following: diagnose the virus, treat it, analyze it, and recommend ways to neutralize it or avoid contracting it.

Doctors are NOT, in any way whatsoever, qualified to offer their opinions on balancing the competing interests of public health vs. the economy and the financial livelihood of citizens. Every doctor I have spoken to does not think we've gone far enough with the lock downs. All of them, to a man, wanted a national lockdown or at least a statewide lockdown. This seems to be what you guys wanted (or at least every single doctor I know), so I don't feel a whole lot of sympathy for hospitals who are suddenly hurting for business.

When it comes to matters of macro and micro economic policy, medical doctors are no more qualified than monkeys, and they should not be consulted or heeded on such matters. Unfortunately, our politicians have made the grave mistake of making economic policy for 320 million people based on the extremely narrow-minded guidance of those unqualified medical doctors. That's why your hospital is in the position it's in, and that's why many working Americans are in the precarious position they are in.

Aggiebrewer said:

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If we are laying off hospital workers cause they are not able to be busy at work...


This panicked economic shutdown was really the wrong way to go

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Correct. We essentially destroyed the livelihoods of millions upon millions of people based on the advice of "medical professionals" who said this was all necessary in order to keep hospital beds from overflowing. As it turns out, it was not necessary, and hospitals aren't even close to capacity. So now the livelihoods of many people in the medical field are going to be destroyed too. Then the government gets to come in with trillions of dollars to try and get everybody back to where we would have been to begin with if we hadn't been stupid enough to listen to medical professionals on matters of economic policy.

PneumAg said:

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Moxley said:

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Texas started getting the word out about social distancing before it started spreading like crazy here and people seem to have taken it more seriously, thankfully. It's obviously pretty difficult to prove a negative in terms of what might have been had we done nothing, but I would take Texas' position over Louisiana or New York any day. However, I would caution that lack of testing may give people a false level of confidence that the virus isn't as bad as what we think. For whatever reason Texas seems to have a high false negative rate. We intubated three more people yesterday with signs / symptoms of viral pneumonia, one of which previously tested negative and the other two still had tests pending. The testing is the most frustrating part of all of this.

That being said, hospitals in Texas are prepping for a big increase that we hope never comes and the executive order banning elective procedures should have never happened. It should have been up to the local level. Our same day surgery crews, OR staff, and one of our nursing units are all being reassigned as possible or on furlough. We've also reduced hours for lab personnel, dietary, and have cancelled every person working under a temporary contract. Just a month ago we were offering five-figure bonuses for new nurse hires because we were so desperate for staff. Now we are in a hiring freeze. If this lasts for another month there will likely be layoffs.

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Lack of testing isn't giving us any false hope. Hospitals are not overrun, and that's what was confidently predicted by many doctors two weeks ago. As long as hospitals still have capacity, testing numbers do not matter. I have six doctors in my immediate and extended family, and every one of them was going crazy sending out text messages and emails telling people to stay in their homes, prepare for mass deaths, this is going to be the worst thing we've ever seen, we're getting ready to go to war, we need a nationwide shutdown, etc.

Doctors are qualified to do the following: diagnose the virus, treat it, analyze it, and recommend ways to neutralize it or avoid contracting it.

Doctors are NOT, in any way whatsoever, qualified to offer their opinions on balancing the competing interests of public health vs. the economy and the financial livelihood of citizens. Every doctor I have spoken to does not think we've gone far enough with the lock downs. All of them, to a man, wanted a national lockdown or at least a statewide lockdown. This seems to be what you guys wanted (or at least every single doctor I know), so I don't feel a whole lot of sympathy for hospitals who are suddenly hurting for business.

When it comes to matters of macro and micro economic policy, medical doctors are no more qualified than monkeys, and they should not be consulted or heeded on such matters. Unfortunately, our politicians have made the grave mistake of making economic policy for 320 million people based on the extremely narrow-minded guidance of those unqualified medical doctors. That's why your hospital is in the position it's in, and that's why many working Americans are in the precarious position they are in.

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I don't understand how someone can say "we don't need to worry about this", when every single person in NYC, NO, LA, Atlanta, Detroit, and other hotspots are saying "I wish we'd taken action sooner".

There isn't much evidence yet that being Texan is a defense to COVID-19. It just hasn't hit us yet.

Any laid off medical workers looking for a temporary gig can see about flying into NYC as I believe they have relaxed licensing restrictions - plenty of work available there so I've heard.