Days after devastating Hurricane Ian made landfall on Florida’s southwest coast on Thursday, September 28, hospitals in southwest Florida are moving forward to manage the moment, following the most devastating hurricane to hit the western side of that state in decades, and a hurricane that might end up being one of the most destructive to property in U.S. history. As of Monday, October 3, hospital leaders were working to recover from the meteorological event, as rescue and recovery operations moved forward. The hospitals’ work forward continued even as first responders moved in to rescue local residents in the Fort Myers area and nearby who remained trapped in their homes, with an undetermined number of individuals being taken to local hospitals for treatmen.
On Sunday, October 2 on “Weekend Edition Sunday” on National Public Radio, host Ayesha Rasco spoke with Florida Hospital Association CEO Mary Mayhew about conditions in the moment. Rascoe asked, “How are hospital evacuations going right now?” “Over the last several days, there has been a coordinated effort with the hospitals in southwest Florida to evacuate critical patients,” Mayhew said. “That has been done through state resources, the deployment of ambulances, air transport and with all of the other hospitals around the state. Thousands of beds have been made available to accept evacuated patients. Air transport and ambulances have been deployed from hospitals around the state to support this effort.”
“Can you tell us about the extent of the damage the hurricane caused to medical facilities?” “Well, certainly, the destruction in southwest Florida and specifically in the Fort Myers area is unimaginable,” Mayhew said. “Now, thankfully, hospitals have been hardening their facilities for years to withstand hurricanes. There is not considerable damage to our hospitals. The biggest challenge that our hospitals have faced is the interruption of key public services, the electrical grid, and most especially the disruption in the public water supply. That has been the biggest challenge to sustaining operations of our hospitals in that area.” Asked how many medical facilities remain “non-operational,” Mayhew told Rascoe that, “Right now there are five hospitals that over the last several days have been dealing with the loss of power and the loss of water. Now, thankfully, today, four of those five hospitals now have power and the water issues have been improved. There still is one hospital that is without water, and the remaining hospitals are still dealing with water pressure issues. But the situation is improving dramatically.”
Asked by Rascoe how many patients were currently affected, as of Sunday morning, Mayhew said that “It's about 900 patients among those hospitals. And again, some of the individuals over the last several days, some of the patients have been transferred to other hospitals around the state.”
Meanwhile, Josh Marcus, a San Francisco-based reporter for the London-based Independent, wrote on Sunday that “Hurricane Ian has sent Florida hospitals into crisis mode in the area around Fort Myers, where the Category 4 hurricane made landfall with sustained winds up to 150 miles per hour. Inside the region’s Health Park Medical Center, there’s no running water, causing patients and staff to defecate in plastic bags, and preventing doctors from being able to adequately sanitize medical instruments, anonymous staff members told NBC News.The situation has caused the hospital to evacuate high-risk patients via helicopter and ambulance to other facilities, as biohazard bins fill with human waste,” he wrote, quoting a report from Friday, Sep. 30 by Deon J. Hampton, Kalhan Rosenblatt, Aria Bendix, and Corky Siemaszko of NBC News.
Fortunately, FHA’s Mayhew told NPR’s Rascoe on Sunday that “Gratefully, there have been so many resources deployed to this area. Governor DeSantis made sure that there were very large tankers with water deployed to the area. The hospitals have been able to pump water from other nearby sources. There have been fire trucks deployed to the hospitals with water. So there have been a lot of resources that have been brought to these hospitals to support over the last several days their need for water.” And, per moving forward in the coming days, Mayhew added that, “Hospitals are urgently repairing damage. Those hospitals that closed in neighboring Charlotte - they are urgently working to reopen their facility. These hospitals are incredibly resilient. Their teams are focused on prioritization of sustained operations because we've got so many individuals, as well, through the search-and-rescue operations that will need hospital level of care.”
