U.S. Surgeon General Urges Hospitals To Suspend Elective Surgeries During Coronavirus Outbreak
WASHINGTON D.C. (KDKA) - In a tweet Saturday morning, the United States Surgeon General Jerome Adams urged hospitals and healthcare systems to consider suspend elective surgical procedures amid the outbreak of COVID-19.
Hospital & healthcare systems, PLEASE CONSIDER STOPPING ELECTIVE PROCEDURES until we can #FlattenTheCurve! ????????
Each elective surgery you do:
1) Brings possible #Coronavirus to your facilities
2) Pulls from PPE stores
3) Taxes personnel who may be needed for #COVIDー19 response https://t.co/WAUTXF5Vyc— U.S. Surgeon General (@Surgeon_General) March 14, 2020
His recommendation came from the American College of Surgeons who are warning health officials that elective surgeries could put a strain on the healthcare system.
"Each hospital, health system, and surgeon should thoughtfully review all scheduled elective procedures with a plan to minimize, postpone, or cancel electively scheduled operations, endoscopies, or other invasive procedures until we have passed the predicted inflection point in the exposure graph and can be confident that our health care infrastructure can support a potentially rapid and overwhelming uptick in critical patient care needs," they said in a release on their website.
"Flattening the curve" refers to citizens taking steps to combat the spread of coronavirus through measures including social distancing, washing their hands, and avoiding large crowds.
Adams also warned that not suspending elective surgeries could bring coronavirus to hospitals and keep personnel that would be needed for COVID-19 response from being available.
So far, there have been 47 cases of coronavirus in Pennsylvania, two of those cases confirmed in Pittsburgh.
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