Nearly 40% of Miami-Dade hospital ventilators in use as COVID-19 surge continues

Almost 40% of the working ventilators in hospitals across Miami-Dade are now in use, and a third of them have gone to COVID-19 inpatients who are overwhelmingly unvaccinated, according to renewed daily reporting by the county.

Of 276 new COVID-19 patients placed in Miami-Dade hospital beds Friday and Saturday, all but 31 were unvaccinated. Twenty-six percent of intensive care unit occupants are there for COVID-19 complications.

That figure, 26%, also represents the share of acute care bed occupants across 21 local health care facilities — including Aventura Hospital, Baptist Hospital, Doctors Hospital, Mount Sinai Medical Center and several Jackson Health System locations — who have been hospitalized because of the virus.

As the COVID-19 positivity in Miami-Dade last week climbed past 12% — a 2% uptick and the highest it’s been since last August, when vaccines weren’t publicly available — the number of unvaccinated residents in hospitals is mounting.

Occupied beds in Miami-Dade’s public hospital network, Jackson Health System, have quadrupled over the last month, driven primarily by a surge in COVID-19 cases, Jackson CEO Carlos Migoya said.

Miami-Dade Mayor Daniella Levine Cava said in a statement that the situation in the county is “becoming as dire as it was last year, with hospitals reaching capacity, packed emergency rooms and positivity rates” and double-digit positivity rates.

“The difference,” she said, “is that this year we have a solution ready with the COVID-19 vaccine.”

Of 1,354 ventilators available in Miami-Dade hospitals, 39.5% are now in use. More than a third of them, 180, went to COVID-19 patients.

Miami-Dade’s positivity rate — the percentage of COVID-19 tests that come back positive for the virus — has continued to rise even though the county’s vaccination level, at 78% of 12-and-older residents, is the highest among all 67 Florida counties.

But not so coincidentally, the county’s positivity rate is also the lowest of all counties in the state.

The highest positivity rate belongs to Union County, which saw 36% of COVID-19 tests come back positive last week. Union only has 45% of its 12-and-older population vaccinated, and that’s far from worst; 27 other counties in Florida have equal or lower vaccination rates.

COVID-19 has roared back through the highly transmissible delta variant of the virus, which spreads about two to three times faster than the original version of the virus and accounts for almost all new COVID-19 cases in the United States.

In response to the new wave of infections, several Florida counties, cities and school districts, including Miami-Dade, resurrected some masking restrictions.

Those efforts continue to face opposition in Tallahassee. After Broward County Public Schools voted to keep an existing classroom mask mandate in place when school resumes in the county Aug. 18, prompting school districts in Miami-Dade and Orange counties to indicate they may do the same, Gov. Ron DeSantis issued an executive order Friday forbidding school districts from requiring masks this year.

School districts that flout the order could face defunding.

The move echoed an order DeSantis issued in March waiving all fines against people or businesses violating local COVID-19 ordinances, which he said place people “under the heavy hand of government.”

______

Editor’s note: A previous version of this story said nearly 60% of ventilators were in use. The correct number is 40%. We regret the error.