An 11-month-old girl in Houston, Texas, had to be airlifted to a hospital in a different city because no paediatric hospitals in Houston would accept her as a transfer patient.
“She needed to be intubated immediately because she was having seizures,” said Patricia Darnauer, the administrator for LBJ Hospital. “We looked at all five major paediatric hospital groups and none [had beds] available.”
The little girl will be receiving treatment at Baylor Scott & White McLane Children’s Medical Center some 220 kilometres away.
The situation is sad but not surprising for Dr Christina Propst, who is one of the most outspoken pediatricians in Houston. Ever since the pandemic began in the US, Dr Propst has encouraged masking, social distancing, and being cautious to anyone who would listen.
“The emergency rooms at the major children’s hospitals here in Houston, the largest medical center in the world, are extremely crowded,” said Dr Propst. “They are filling, if not full, as are the hospitals and intensive care units.”
Delta variant infecting more children
Dr Propst and other clinicians ascribed the scarcity of paediatric beds, to the delta variant of COVID noticeably affecting more children, as well as being more transmissible. Texas Children’s Hospital has 30 children and adolescents hospitalised with COVID, compared to their January peak of 40.
However, the problem is worsened by widespread cases of Respiratory Syncytial Virus (RSV) in children. This is all taking place during the summer break for US schools, where doctors are used to injuries from playing outdoors.
Darnauer spoke of high numbers of patients at her hospital. “We are back beyond our pre-pandemic volumes at LBJ.”
Dr Propst advises mask wearing for those children not old enough for the vaccine, and she would also like to see Texas once again allow public schools to mandate masks. Unlike many other countries, COVID health regulations are largely up to individual states.
“If children are not masking in schools, it will be a major problem,” said Dr Propst.
She added that, even in normal times, the start of the school year generally causes a lot of germs to spread.
“It is typical that two weeks after school we see a great surge of strep and other sources of infection. We are bracing ourselves, not a question of when, it will be bad,” she said.
Source: ABC13
