Louisiana hospitals full of Delta patients are just starting to empty after a record surge of Covid infections. Now come evacuations ahead of the storm surge from powerful Hurricane Ida. But not for hospitals. There is nowhere to send patients (Associated Press):
Gov. John Bel Edwards said evacuation of hospitals in threatened areas is something that would normally be considered under other scenarios, but it’s impractical as COVID-19 patients fill beds in Louisiana and elsewhere.
“That isn’t possible. We don’t have any place to bring those patients. Not in state, not out of state,” Edwards explained.
Officials at Ochsner Health, which runs the largest hospital network in the state, said Saturday that they considered evacuating some of their facilities closer to the coast but that wasn’t possible considering how packed other hospitals are in their network. Roughly 15 of their hospitals are in areas potentially affected by Ida. But they did evacuate some individual patients with particular medical needs from smaller hospitals in more rural areas to their larger facilities.
Hurricane Ida is expected to make landfall as a Category 4 (or perhaps 5) hurricane (CNN):
Hurricane Ida became a Category 4 storm early Sunday morning, rapidly intensifying to sustained winds of 150 mph, according to the National Hurricane Center.
That’s just 7 mph from making Ida a Category 5 storm. It was 60 miles south of the mouth of the Mississippi River, NHC forecasters said in a 7 a.m. ET update, as the storm continued its march toward Louisiana and the Gulf Coast at 15 mph.
The hurricane has quickly increased in intensity since striking Cuba on Friday, threatening to be an “extremely dangerous major hurricane” when it makes its projected landfall along the Louisiana coast Sunday afternoon.
It will be the 16th anniversary of Hurricane Katrina’s landfall in 2005 as a Category 3.
In New Orleans’ Lower Ninth Ward, Audrey Perkins was all packed and set to evacuate with relatives to Texas when her 96-year-old mother, who has dementia, announced that she wouldn’t be leaving. So Perkins, in tears, decided to stay with her. In 2005, Perkins left her father in the city during Katrina.
“He didn’t want to go, and we all just pulled off and left him,” Perkins said, as tears began running down her cheek. “He said he would be all right, but then he went on to heaven and drowned during Katrina.
“So if she ain’t going, I’m going with her,” Perkins said of her mother, as she glanced up at the sky. “I’m not going to leave her here alone like they did my daddy.”
Katrina killed 1,833 people and displaced millions in New Orleans and along the Gulf Coast. Perkins’ father was among many to drown in the city during the storm.”
I’m just waiting for some jackass preacher to blame what’s coming on God’s judgment for whatever grievance the reverend has against whomever for whatever.
Rental cars are gone. The highways are clogged. Some filling stations are out of gas. The airport in New Orleans is shut down.