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 The weather disaster hit a state where hospitals are crowded with
COVID patients, cases of the Delta variant were surging and nurses
were in short supply.
A handful of smaller hospitals have been forced to evacuate
patients, while all major regional hospitals were doing fine for
now, Dr. Joseph Kanter, the top medical official in Louisiana, told
Reuters by phone.
"Outside of a few, small outlying hospitals, it doesn't appear to be
anything catastrophic," said Kanter, who worked through the
harrowing days of Hurricane Katrina in 2005 when some two dozen
hospitals in New Orleans had to be evacuated.
Warner Thomas, the CEO of Ochsner Health, the largest healthcare
provider in the state, said Monday night that two of its smaller
hospitals southwest of New Orleans had been evacuated because of
damage to roofs and flooding. That affected 65 patients at St. Anne
Hospital and Leonard J. Chabert Medical Center, where temporary
roofing was being installed.
Thomas said Ochsner helped move about 100 patients from Terrebone
General Medical Center in Houma, southwest of New Orleans, which is
a partner hospital with Ochsner.
So far there were no reports of any injuries to patients or staff
members because of Hurricane Ida, Thomas said.
All Ochsner hospitals in New Orleans suffered roof damage and are
working on generator power as electricity remains out, Thomas said,
including powering operating rooms where surgeries are still being
carried out. The facilities have a 10-day supply of fuel on site,
with more on the way already. Nearly all of Louisiana was without
power Monday.
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 Many hospitals were using their
own water wells while they awaited the
restoration of city water services, he said.
"The biggest challenge in the coming days is around our people,"
Thomas said.
Doctors, nurses and other staff members have damage to their homes
or no power. Ochsner is working on housing them in hotels and
elsewhere. Louisiana was already facing a shortage of more than
6,000 nurses before the storm hit, so having more personnel out
dealing with damage to their homes would put even more stress on the
system, Thomas said.
Dr. Rebekah Gee, who until last year was the health secretary for
Louisiana and now leads Louisiana State University's healthcare
services division, worried about where evacuated patients would go
when wards are filled with COVID patients and how the spread of
COVID would be impacted.
"This is a perfect petri dish condition for COVID to grow," she
said. "People are in close quarters, they aren't going outside, and
a lot of congregate sheltering is going to be starting."
(Reporting by Brad Brooks in Lubbock, Texas; Editing by Donna
Bryson, Cynthia Osterman and Gerry Doyle)
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