With ICU capacity at 100% across Southern California, hospitals are implementing surge plans to increase capacity. But public health officials say it s not so much a question of having enough bed space, but rather having enough frontline health care workers to care for patients. What we re seeing in the ICUs is we ve got some space, and they re able to move stuff around and free up space, said Shane Reichardt, public information officer for the Riverside County Emergency Management Department. But our staff in the ICU is really low.
At the Riverside University Health Systems Medical Center in Moreno Valley, partitions and curtains have been set up in the hospital to create more ICU bed space. But finding the personnel to care for patients is difficult.