GREEN BAY, WI (WTAQ) — The cancellation of the NCAA tournament. The suspension of the NBA, NHL, and MLB seasons. A nearly-empty Resch Center for the WIAA Girls State Basketball Tournament. A European travel ban. All of that in less than 24 hours and all a part of the ongoing outbreak of the COVID-19 Coronavirus in the United States.
Dr. Ashok Rai is the President and CEO of Prevea Health. He says that while the social disruption may hurt, the alternative is worse.
“Canceling events, quarantining people, yes, it’s inconvenient and in many cases it’s heartbreaking,” Rai told WTAQ on Thursday. “But our whole intent is to slow down the spread of a virus that we don’t know much about, but we know it spreads quickly, and we know it is deadly.”
The biggest worry among health officials across the nation is avoiding a surge of cases and patients in hospitals, tying up and overwhelming medical services. Rai says obeying the now-ubiquitous advice to wash your hands thoroughly, don’t touch your mouth or face and avoid large groups of people is the first step towards avoiding that scenario.
“Hype and fear is [what happens] when the health systems collapse because we’re overwhelmed by people who did not obey the advice that was given,” said Rai. “That’s our worry right now.”
As of Thursday afternoon, a total of eight cases of the COVID-19 Coronavirus have been detected in Wisconsin. Seven of those cases were announced in the past week.
How far and how fast, exactly, the virus will spread isn’t something that’s clear. COVID-19, as a novel virus, isn’t something that’s been seen before.
“The biggest problem, right now, is that we don’t have enough testing,” said Rai. “So it’s really hard for me, right now or a trained epidemologist to predict anything without more testing.”
Right now, only two testing centers are operating in Wisconsin.
Prevea Health is ready, though, for if and when a COVID-19 patient walks through their doors. Procedures are already in place across the clinic system.
“Anybody with symptoms we’re triaging, effectively,” said Rai. “We’d rather them call us or use our virtual platform as these are not patients that generally need to be seen, and we want to keep them socially isolated.”
Most cases of COVID-19 will not be severe enough to warrant hospitalization. Of the seven active cases in Wisconsin, only one has been admitted to the hospital.
“Obviously for those who are extremely sick, we have our emergency departments,” Rai said. ” We can triage them, but we want to be able to secure the patient so that we can secure the spread.”
Wisconsin Governor Tony Evers declared a Public Health Emergency on Thursday. State health officials are recommending the cancellation of all events with over 250 attendees.
