Governor Brian Kemp announced Monday he is adding resource staffing to Georgia hospitals as more emergency departments say they are severely full.
Governor Kemp and Georgia’s Public Health Commissioner Dr. Kathleen Toomey holding press conference Monday afternoon to give an update on the state’s efforts to help relieve hospitals.
“[The virus,] it’s making a b-line for unvaccinated individuals,” Dr. Toomey said. “The good news is vaccines do work.
Toomey says hospitals are seeing more young patients than at any other time. “We are seeing increases among younger people than we ever had before 30-, 40- and 50-year-olds,” Toomey stated.
The state’s Department of Community Health had committed $500 million dollars through October to bring 1,300 staff members to 68 hospitals across our state. Kemp announced an expansion to the efforts through December.
“Commissioner Noggle and her team will increase the total of state supported hospital staff from 1,300 to 2,800, more than doubling our staffing assistance to date,” Kemp announced. 170 new staff members will go directly to rural hospitals, Kemp stated. 450 beds in nine regional coordinating hospitals will be made available to treat patients soon.
“Virtually every hospitals most pressing issue is lack of qualified staff to treat the patients coming through the door,” Kemp said.
More than 12 of metro Atlanta’s busiest hospitals are listed as severely full by the state and are diverting patients to other locations for emergencies. More than 90% are suffering from the Delta variant and the majority of COVID patients are unvaccinated.
Lisa Licata says her daughter has been vaccinated but has been feeling sick. Licata sat parked in a miles-long line for COVID testing on Roswell Road in Marietta.
“She has cold symptoms and even though she is vaccinated we don’t know the difference,” Licata said. “Things feel pretty open and I think people are worried and they need to get tested to see,” Licata went on.
She’s one of dozens who waited for hours to know their status at the Marietta vaccine site
“I went to the one in Dallas and waited three hours and they ran out of tests so I came here,” said Shawn McGanns.
Kemp announced he is giving state employees September 3rd off from work to encourage them to get vaccinated that day or prior to the Labor Day holiday.
Kemp remains committed to his stance against mask or vaccine mandates. He says he will leave the decisions on masks up to local school leaders.
“Georgia will remain open for business. We will not shut down. We will not prevent families from preventing a paycheck,” Kemp said. He later added that he believes masks mandates push people into a corner and he is encouraging Georgian’s to talk to their physicians about getting vaccinated.
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