Thread by @Craig_A_Spencer

For @TheAtlantic I wrote about how two years of this pandemic has strained hospitals and healthcare workers.

When I got vaccinated against COVID a year ago, I was already exhausted. But there was hope on the horizon.

Sadly, here we are again...🧵

theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/…

With Omicron looming we a face a grim truth:

You can’t surge a circuit that’s been burned out. For frontline providers, there’s simply no new fuse that can fix the fact that we’re fried.

ERs have been over capacity the past few months with the Delta wave and non-COVID care.

Hospitals are doing everything they can to cope.

Cancel elective surgeries.

Try to hire more workers.

Others are taking even more drastic measures, like the hospitals in Cleveland that published a nearly full-page ad with a single word:

But all of that is unlikely to turn things around.

There’s no nice way to put this: In much of the country, the next few months will be a really bad time to be really sick with COVID-19.

Or to break an ankle.

Or to get appendicitis.

theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/…

Without a good nurse by its side, a hospital bed is no better than a hotel. And nationwide there just aren't enough nurses.

Nurses bear a disproportionate toll of the pandemic. They spend more time at the bedside of sick patients. They were more likely to die from Covid as well.

But many have quit. Those remaining are taking care of more and more patients.

As an ER doc I promise you want to be fully vaccinated when you meet Omicron. And that seems like only a matter of time.

I assume every person I meet at this point has COVID. theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/…

Even so, we can still stay safe: Upgrade your masks. Limit the size of indoor gatherings and rapid test if you can.

And if you can, say thanks to that healthcare worker you've been texting for advice the past 2 years.

They probably really need it now.
theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/…