COVID cases nearly double at Duke Hospital this week, hundreds of staff infected
At Duke University Hospital, the number of COVID-19 patients has jumped by 42% since Monday, a surge that is straining medical care and threatens to worsen with the New Year’s holiday.
Roughly 400 Duke employees have tested positive for the virus over the last week, though not all of them clinical staff. But with 150 of them testing COVID-positive on Wednesday alone — the highest number for the pandemic — the hospital is scrambling to care for the crush of new patients.
“People need to really move away from the idea that this is mild,” said Dr. Cameron Wolfe, a Duke professor of infectious disease. “It’s not mild for us. We have to cancel surgeries. You can only defer a bypass surgery a few days before people run into trouble.”
North Carolina shattered its record for daily COVID-19 cases Thursday, adding more than 18,500 new cases to its total. The previous record for one-day cases was previously set in January with 11,581 new cases, NC DHHS reported.
NC DHHS also reported Thursday that the number of people visiting the emergency room for “COVID-like illness” had set a record at 4,171.
Wolfe said he suspects nearly all the recent cases stem from the omicron variant, and that hospitalized patients are nearly all unvaccinated. Duke is only beginning to see the uptick from Christmas travel, he added, offering this message for those making New Year’s plans.
“God, if I could implore someone to make sensible and community-minded decisions over New Year’s Eve, that would be an absolute plea. ... You need to be aware you are absolutely contributing to our crunch. You need to be aware that absent a booster your protection is diminished.”
Hospitalizations up at UNC Health, WakeMed
Meanwhile, across UNC Health Systems, COVID-19 hospitalizations have risen from 255 to 345 since Monday — a 35% jump. Spokesman Alan Wolf noted UNC had declined to 77 patients on Nov. 20, just before Thanksgiving.
“We continue to encourage everyone to get vaccinated and boosted,” he said. “The vaccines are the most important tools we have to avoid hospitalization, serious illness and death.”
More than 530 UNC employees are out due to COVID, Wolf said.
“Despite ongoing staffing challenges during this pandemic, UNC Health continues to provide excellent care for all of our patients,” he added in an email. “As we’ve done previously, we will adjust our operations as needed, such as reducing non-emergency surgeries and shifting resources.”
WakeMed reported a slower, steady increase in patients totaling 101 Thursday. No COVID-19 patients are in intensive-care or on a ventilator, but 86% are unvaccinated, said Kristin Kelly, spokeswoman.
North Carolina confirmed its first omicron case early in December after a UNC-Charlotte student traveled out of state for Thanksgiving. The state’s positive test rate hit a record-high 21.9% Sunday.
At Duke, Wolfe said people who are fully vaccinated with a booster shot stand very little chance of getting seriously ill. But because the omicron variant is so contagious, the sheer number of people contracting it combines with comorbidity, or the simultaneous presence of another disease. This pushes more people into hospital beds.
The vaccines’ effectiveness against omicron has dropped significantly because the variant is so good at getting around the first two shots, Wolfe said, but protection doubles with a booster.
On top of this, he said, hospitals are running out of monoclonal antibody treatment. Duke has only 60 system-wide.
“I will not be able to offer it to the vast majority of people,” he said.
This story was originally published December 30, 2021 at 1:18 PM with the headline "COVID cases nearly double at Duke Hospital this week, hundreds of staff infected."