View Comments Thousands of patients have been treated in the tents set up outside Sierra View Medical Center's emergency department since they were put up more than a year ago. Those tents came down this week amid an "all-time low" number of COVID-19 cases being treated at the Porterville hospital. Beginning May 1, the hospital will also modify its visitor policy to allow one unique visitor for patients admitted to the emergency department. The emergency-use tents were installed at the beginning of the pandemic's arrival in Tulare County to screen patients for the virus. The structures' temporary use permits expired this month, and the hospital opted not to renew them "due to the tent structures being underutilized for several weeks," the hospital said.