‘We’re approaching that peak rapidly,’ COVID hospitalizations locally continue growing

DAYTON — Dayton Children’s Hospital said it is tight with its capacity as the region continues to see a rise in COVID-19 hospitalizations as cases also continue growing.

“We are tight on capacity today, due to Mondays always being our highest admit days. But, currently we are able to make room for anyone who needs to stay with us,” a spokeswoman for Dayton Children’s Hospital said. “We ask that the community recognize how serious this is and wear masks and get vaccinated, if eligible.”

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Dayton Children’s reported having 13 kids actively in the hospital with COVID-19 Tuesday.

Dayton Children’s Hospital CEO Debbie Feldman said Dayton Children’s has been at “red-bed’ status 55 percent of the time since mid-August, and recently only had two beds available for children.

While Dayton Children’s Hospital has not had to open up additional COVID-19 units, other hospitals in the region have.

“Like many hospital systems in Ohio, Kettering Health has had to reopen units to accommodate the latest surge of COVID-19 patients,” said James Buechele, spokesman for Kettering Health. “We remain capable of caring for all of our patients, and we are constantly assessing the pandemic and adapting our approach to provide the best care possible for our community.”

The Miami Valley region has seen a steady growth of COVID-19 hospitalizations since the beginning of July, when state health leaders said the Delta variant became a significant amount of the COVID-19 cases in Ohio.

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“Unfortunately, we’re approaching that peak rapidly. We peaked last December at 522 patients hospitalized in the region. But remember, that was at a time period where we still had a mask mandate in effect and we did not have the rollout of the vaccines,” said Sarah Hackenbracht with the Greater Dayton Area Hospital Association. “We are, as of today, at 377 patients hospitalized across the region. And those numbers keep trending upward and trending upward quickly.”

On Tuesday, the Ohio Hospital Association reported 3,494 people in the hospital with COVID-19, which was one of six people who were hospitalized across the state. One in four people in the ICU across Ohio also have COVID-19.

Hospitalizations, while not at the peak seen in the fall and winter, are up over 1,000 percent from 60 days ago.

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