A fourth of U.S. hospitals are reporting a critical staff shortage as Omicron drives a rise in Covid-19 cases

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Mon, 2022-01-10 09:17 — mike kraft

(CNN) About 24% of US hospitals are reporting a "critical staffing shortage," according to data from the US Department of Health and Human Services, as public health experts warn the Covid-19 surge fueled by the Omicron variant threatens the nation's health care system.

"Given how much infection there is, our hospitals really are at the brink right now," Dr. Ashish Jha, dean of Brown University's School of Public Health, told CNN on Sunday.

Of the approximately 5,000 hospitals that reported this data to HHS on Saturday, nearly 1,200 -- about 1 in 4 -- said they are currently experiencing a critical staffing shortage, the largest share of the entire pandemic. More than 100 other hospitals said they anticipate a shortage within the next week.

The US health care system is Jha's greatest concern, he said, noting the Omicron surge could hamper its capacity to care for patients suffering from conditions other than Covid-19.

"The health care system is not just designed to take care of people with Covid ... it's designed to take care of kids with appendicitis and people who have heart attacks and get into car accidents," he said.

"And all of that is going to be much, much more difficult because we have a large proportion of the population that is not vaccinated, plenty of high risk people who are not boosted," he said. "That combination sets up a large pool of people who as they get infected will end up really straining the resources we have in the hospitals today."

These staff shortages are growing as frontline health care workers are either infected or forced to quarantine due to exposure to Covid-19 just as the demand for treatment skyrockets: More than 138,000 Covid-19 patients were in US hospitals as of Saturday, according to the Department of Health and Human Services. That's not far from the all-time peak (about 142,200 in mid-January 2021) and an increase from around 45,000 in early November. ...

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