WA Hospital Association Shares Concerns Over Stagnant COVID Cases

SEATTLE — COVID-19 case counts and hospitalizations have remained relatively stable over recent weeks, but are still much too high, warns the Washington State Hospital Association.

At the association's briefing Monday, WSHA Executive Vice President Taya Briley explained that, while the situation does not appear to be getting worse, Washington's average case counts are higher than they ever had been before this latest surge, and that extra precautions and restrictions may be necessary if they don't start to improve.

According to Briley, an average of 1,007 Washingtonians were hospitalized with COVID-19 each day of the week ending Monday.

"One thousand hospitalizations per day was the peak of the surge that we had in December of 2020, and at that time, if you remember, we introduced significant additional mitigation measures to try and get the COVID-19 numbers under control," Briley said.

That's not much better than the week prior, when Washington averaged 1,013 hospitalizations a day. The number of serious cases has also stagnated: an average of 177 of hospitalized patients were on ventilators last week, down just 5 percent from 187 the week before.

While Washington had been seeing progress containing new COVID-19 infections until just recently, the relative stagnation now has some doctors concerned, Briley said.

"One thing we don't know about a plateau, is whether the cases are going to go up or down from here," Briley said. "We need your help to do everything we can to get those cases to go down."

Washington can't afford to see case counts or hospitalizations climb again: already ICUs across Washington are 87 percent full, and acute care units are 89 percent full — and flu season is just beginning.

The hospital association says Washington does not want to end up back where it was in early September, when booming COVID-19 cases had doctors worried that hospitals would become overwhelmed, and debating the possibility of rationing health care. Fortunately, WSHA says, the solution to the problem is well known.

"Please get vaccinated for COVID-19 and flu, mask and follow social distancing recommendations," Briley said.