HOUSTON – In the Texas Medical Center, there were on average less than 200 COVID patients admitted per day last week.
That number is down from last month when there was 300 to 400 daily admission, which is a record high during the pandemic.
GALVESTON
Wednesday Galveston County reported 74 new cases. The last time they had that exact number was on July 21. That’s the day cases from the Clear Creek Church started to be counted and numbers continued to rise after that. Just one month ago, Galveston County was reporting 282 new cases.
MONTGOMERY
The latest number of ICU patients in Montgomery County is 58. That’s down from the recent Delta-peak of 115, which happened on Sept. 3.
FORT BEND
The latest number of ICU patients in Fort Bend County is 23. That’s down from the recent Delta-peak of 48, which happened on Aug. 26.
“I think we’re not quite there to pre-July levels, but we are getting there,” said Dr. Luis Ostrosky, medical director for epidemiology at Memorial Hermann and chief of infectious diseases at UT Health.
Like most doctors, Ostrosky will tell you it’s not time to celebrate, but he does agree the numbers are encouraging.
What remains a continuous problem is the shortage of hospital staff they’ve lost since the pandemic began.
“It’s still difficult to move patients around easily, find beds, find OR’s, so it’s not really where we want it to be,” Ostrosky said.
Why the improvement now?
Ostrosky said it’s possible the virus is cyclical and we’ll continue to see ups and downs.
He also said more people have been vaccinated, more people have had the virus and there was more masking in schools.