COVID-19 update: hospitalizations on the rise

A significant and rapid increase in positive COVID-19 cases and hospitalizations at all San Antonio hospitals is very concerning. With Juneteenth observances and the Father’s Day weekend, we urge people to be diligent about hand hygiene, maintaining physical distance and wearing masks in public spaces when distancing is not possible. These tactics are proven to reduce the spread of the virus.

Here’s the status today on a scale of: Good, OK, Concerning or Crisis.

Supplies – GOOD

We are closely monitoring our supplies with the goal of keeping at least a 30-day supply of all critical items, and we are in good shape at this time.

Operations – GOOD

We are taking steps to ensure we maintain 15% of our available beds for COVID-19 patients as required by the state, as well as responding to pent-up need for non-COVID-19 care that built up during the shutdown. We are transitioning inpatient rehabilitation beds, as those patients are discharged, to regular non-COVID-19 medicine beds.

We have been asking everyone who enters our facilities to wear a mask if physical distancing is not possible, and providing masks at the door. Moving forward, we will require everyone who enters our facilities to wear masks or face coverings, in support of local emergency orders.

Because of the sharp increase in positive cases, we have had many people without COVID-19 symptoms in the past two weeks come to our urgent care clinics seeking to be tested. We would like to remind the public that our ExpressMed and PediExpress urgent care centers are for when people feel ill, and are not equipped as walk-in testing centers for asymptomatic people. People without symptoms who want to be tested should visit covid19.sanantonio.gov.