ICU bed availability dips across Chicago area as cases increase
CHICAGO - Illinois is considered a high-transmission state for COVID-19.
On Tuesday, Gov. JB Pritzker warned everyone to be cautious as hospitals deal with increased admissions due to the virus
State health officials say a warning level is issued when hospitals have less than 20 percent available spots in their intensive care units and 37 counties are in that situation due to increases in COVID cases, other illnesses and injuries.
Northwestern Hospital in suburban McHenry is over capacity and healthcare workers there are on-duty nonstop.
The current percentages of ICU beds available are:
- Chicago and Cook County 18%
- McHenry & Lake 15%
- Kane & DuPage 22%
- Will & Kankakee 24%
City and suburban positivity rates are trending downward. Statewide, the number of new cases has shown a decline in recent days.
"We’re consistently looking at the menu of options that we may need to impose in order to bring down the numbers. I will remind you that if we are not able to bring these numbers down, if hospitals continue to fill, if the hospital beds and ICU get full like they are in Kentucky — that’s just next door to Illinois. If that happens, we’re going to have to impose significantly greater mitigations," Pritzker said Tuesday during a press conference.