Omicron to peak over next 2 weeks, local ICU not expected to be overwhelmed, WRH says

As the Omicron variant of COVID-19 spreads rapidly in the community, Windsor Regional Hospital (WRH) is bracing for the most severe impact over the next few weeks.

Officials don't expect critical care to be overwhelmed. Instead, the hospital is keeping a closer eye on regular hospital beds because Omicron has shown to be milder compared to the Delta variant.

"Staff is tired," said hospital CEO David Musyj. "As we get to this point, it's [staff being] nervous bordering on exhaustion."

"We haven't seen the full impact of Omicron in our community and definitely not in the hospitals for another couple of weeks," he added.

Following Thursday's board meeting, there are 44 people at Windsor Regional Hospital with COVID-19 and 37 of them are being treated primarily for the disease. Six of those people are in the ICU, all being primarily treated for COVID-19. Five of them are unvaccinated and one is partially vaccinated.

WRH Chief of Staff Dr. Wassim Saad said preliminary data shows for every 100 patients admitted to hospital with the Omicron variant, roughly 90 would occupy a regular bed and less than 10 would take up space in the ICU.

"I don't expect our critical care capacity to be overwhelmed or even come close to it with this wave," said Saad. "We're more worried about medical beds."

Saad also predicts that in four to six weeks the pandemic may be done.

"Everybody will either have been vaccinated, proved to be immune or unfortunately succumbed to the disease," said Saad. "But ultimately that's how you reach herd immunity."

Field hospital not necessary right now

There are ongoing discussions about the need for a field hospital in Windsor-Essex, which was previously at St. Clair College's sports complex. It would take 10 days to get it up and running. Right now, officials say there isn't a need as hospital occupancy is sitting at less than 85 per cent.

"We have a little bit of room, but this room can evaporate and unfortunately with the projections it's going to evaporate very quickly," said Musyj.

When looking at whether a field hospital is necessary, Chief Nursing Executive Karen Riddell said look at hospital capacity locally, in the southwest region and across the province.

If there's no capacity to move patients around, "we'll see that coming and that's when we'll probably have to pull the trigger" on activating the field hospital, she said.

363 employees off work for COVID-related reasons

Another aspect that's complicating the situation is staff being off work for COVID-related reasons. As of Thursday, 363 hospital staff — or 7.5 per cent of the total 4,800 employees — couldn't report to work because they either tested positive for COVID or were a close contact with someone who did.

The number has been slowly increasing over the last week or so. On December 29, roughly 71 staff were off work due to COVID and on Monday that number was 221.

Musyj said they will not be recalling staff who were fired after refusing the COVID-19 vaccine. Roughly 50 hospital staff lost their jobs in October for not complying with the hospital policy.

"We have replaced them and then some since then," said Musyj. "If they want to re-apply, they can, but as vaccinated staff."