During an appearance on Good Morning America Wednesday, Birx said the White House Coronavirus Task Force has been looking for trends in daily case reporting and COVID-19 testing, and that Philadelphia continues to be among the cities they are keeping an eye on.
"We are concerned about the metro area of Washington and Baltimore, and we’re concerned right now about the Philadelphia area,” Birx said. “All of our previous areas appear to be steady at least.”
Birx didn’t offer any specifics about Philadelphia or the region. The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
An independent source anticipated Pennsylvania’s peak demand for hospital resources arriving on April 13, according to a model from the University of Washington’s Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation. On that day, the model predicted, patients would need 2,180 hospital beds and 418 intensive care unit beds. The state should be able to manage that demand, according to the model. Deaths in the state are predicted to peak April 15.
State health officials said Wednesday they have not had any specific conversations with federal authorities about the Philadelphia region becoming the next hot spot, but are prepared for an increase in COVID-19 patients.
“At this time our hospital ICU beds have approximately 41% availability and ventilator availability is over 70%,” said Nate Wardle, a spokesperson for the Pennsylvania Department of Health.
Area hospitals had the luxury of being spared a surge of cases early and have been able to learn from the experiences in hard hit places like New York City, Seattle, and New Orleans, said Jack Lynch, CEO and President of Main Line Health System.
“For the last three weeks we’ve had a dedicated group of folks who are spending most of their time on surge planning," he said. "Do we have the beds to put people in? Do we have the ventilators?”
As of Wednesday morning, there have been 4,272 COVID-19 cases in Philadelphia, and at least 200 deaths in the city and its surrounding counties. On Tuesday, officials reported 47 new deaths in the eight-county Philadelphia region, the worst day yet. But leaders are cautiously optimistic that social distancing efforts are having an impact, because although cases are still rising, a slower rate of increase means the case curve has been flattening in Pennsylvania.
Pennsylvania has been identified as a potential COVID-19 hot spot for some time.
“I think there is a level of concern in regard to the proximity to New York and New Jersey,” Wardle said.
Of most concern is the Philadelphia region, he said, and the state’s northeast.
Health care workers in the region are feeling the strain at their hospitals.
“The numbers are increasing of these patients over the last week or so for sure,” Megan Stobart, an emergency department doctor at Jefferson Hospital, said Monday.
At Temple University Hospital, nurses in the intensive care units feel spread too thin in recent days, said Francine Frezghi, president of Temple University Hospital Nurses Association, a local of the nurses’ union PASNAP.
“We’ve been fine up until maybe three days ago with the increase to the ICU and that will continue to happen,” she said. “You need more ICU nurses than you’ve ever had.”
William Pace, an infectious disease doctor who is on staff at several area hospitals including the Jeanes Campus of Temple University Hospital in Northeast Philly, describes similar scenes.
“Every day, we get more and more,” Pace said Sunday. “I was the busiest at Jeanes initially because there was a bunch of people in the Montgomery County area.”
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