Ray DeMonia urgently needed an intensive care bed after a heart attack – but 43 hospitals in three US states had to refuse him. The intensive care units were overcrowded, especially with unvaccinated Covid-19 patients.
The biggest concern in the corona pandemic has always been the overloading of the health system with Covid-19 patients. A case from the USA shows that this problem is still real despite the vaccination that is now available. In the state of Alabama, a man has died after 43 hospitals were unable to admit him due to a lack of capacity.
The 73-year-old Ray DeMonia came to the emergency room of his hometown hospital in August with a heart attack, reports the Washington Post, citing the family of the deceased. However, the treatment methods that he would have needed were not possible there. The hospital then contacted 43 other clinics in three different states – but the patient could not be admitted there either. Most of the places in the intensive care units were occupied by non-vaccinated people with Covid-19.
Especially unvaccinated people in the intensive care units
Eventually DeMonia was transferred to a Mississippi hospital, more than 300 miles from his hometown. He died there on September 1st, three days before his 74th birthday. A shock for the family: “We never thought that this would happen to us,” his daughter Raven DeMonia told the Washington Post. Unvaccinated people in particular still suffer from severe Covid-19 courses – if more Americans had been vaccinated, DeMonia would possibly still be alive.
His family therefore made an urgent appeal to all unvaccinated people in the obituary: “Please get vaccinated if you have not already done so in order to create capacity for emergencies that are not related to Covid-19.” DeMonia wouldn’t want any other family to experience a tragedy like his.
Almost all ICU beds in Alabama were occupied
US President Joe Biden and leading scientists in the US have been talking about a “pandemic of the unvaccinated” for some time. In some states, the situation in the intensive care units is worsening again, nationwide more than three quarters of the intensive care beds are occupied. The situation is particularly dire in Alabama: According to data from the US Department of Health, almost all intensive care beds are currently in use there. Half of it is occupied with Covid-19 patients.
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