The numbers of COVID-19 patients at The University of Kansas Health System continue to improve today. 14 people with the active virus are being treated, down from 15 Friday. Of those patients, three are in the ICU, the same as Friday. Two of those ICU patients are on ventilators today, up from one on Friday. 23 other patients are still hospitalized because of COVID-19 but are out of the acute infection phase, down from 31 Friday. That’s a total of 37 patients, down from 46 on Friday. In addition, HaysMed has a total of nine COVID-19 inpatients, down from ten Friday, with two of those active patients and seven in the recovery phase.
On today’s Morning Media Update, Dr. Kenny Southwick, Executive Director, Cooperating School Districts of Greater Kansas City and Dr. Jennifer Watts, pediatric emergency medicine at Children's Mercy-KC discussed some of the challenges with vaccinating teachers on both sides of the state line. Plus, they updated conversations around virus variant surveillance among teachers.
Dr. Southwick explained the role of his organization in supporting 32 school districts on the Missouri side, as well as several on the Kansas side. He described some of their biggest challenges, including feeding kids who could not be in school because of the pandemic, plus keeping schools safe for teachers, staff, cooks, custodians, and bus drivers. He’s grateful now that the Missouri governor has declared tier three of the vaccination plan will begin on March 15, the mass vaccination of teachers can begin. He says while there is still some vaccine hesitancy, most of the educators want the vaccine. His organization is working with the health system on messages to help the hesitant become more comfortable. He says the goal is to bring all students safely back into the school buildings as soon possible. He anticipates students will still need to wear masks at school when classes start in the fall. He urges parents and families considering travel this spring break to be very cautious so we don’t have a repeat of the outbreaks that occurred after spring break last year.
Dr. Watts says starting on March 15, mass vaccination clinics for teachers will be set up in Johnson County in Kansas and Jackson County in Missouri. She has been working with school districts all over the area on ways to get kids safely back to classrooms. She says since most of the Johnson County schools have been in session for elementary students, it’s important for them to find ways to have the teachers vaccinated in ways that don’t disrupt the classroom. She is thrilled by the lack of flu cases, which in past years have shut down entire schools and districts. She says it’s too soon to say when children under 16 will get the vaccine, as clinical trials are just now being planned for that age group. She thinks if we’re lucky, it could come by the end of this year, but most likely will happen sometime in 2022.
Dana Hawkinson, MD, medical director of Infection Prevention and Control at The University of Kansas Health System, remembered what it was like at the health system a year ago today as they admitted the first COVID-19 patient, and wondered what would happen if they got two patients. He described how much the medical community has learned in the past year, including new protocols and procedures to keep patients safe and the development of treatments for COVID-19 patients both in and out of the hospital. He urges us all to be vigilant, especially with spring break coming and the virus variants out there and reminds us still to wear our masks and to get the vaccine as soon as it’s offered. Those steps, he says, will help us get our kids into the classroom faster.
David Wild, MD, VP of Performance Improvement at The University of Kansas Health system, filled in for Dr. Stites. He too remembered things from a year ago and says we’ve come a long way. One of the best changes, he noted, was the collaboration among health systems and physician leaders across the Metro that didn’t exist before. He reminds us that vaccines are not a silver bullet for COVID-19, but simply another tool along with masking, social distancing and avoiding large groups to keep the virus from spreading. He says we are not out of the woods yet and urges us all not to let our guard down.
Tuesday, March 9 at 8:00 a.m. is the next Morning Media Update. KDHE Secretary Dr. Lee Norman is back to update the vaccine rollout, the current infection rate and give us insight into what is happening with an Ebola outbreak in the Congo.
ATTENTION: media procedure for calling in:
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