LOS ANGELES (AP) — A military hospital ship that arrived in Los Angeles on Friday will provide 1,000 beds for non-coronavirus patients to relieve over-burdened medical centers expected to be hit with a surge of COVID-19 cases in the coming days.
The US Naval Ship Mercy pulled into port a day after Los Angeles saw a 50% jump in coronavirus cases. California has a total of 4,040 cases and deaths increased to 82, according to numbers kept by Johns Hopkins University.
Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti and California Gov. Gavin Newsom are expected to visit the Mercy, which could begin receiving patients over the weekend.
“The proposal we’re recommending is that we do a slow ramp up” with patients, ship Capt. John Rotruck said. “We would start slowly with a number like five for the first day, then doubling that and doubling again. A number like that would be a reasonable start.”
Meanwhile, California has hired retired state workers and transferred other employees to help process an avalanche of over 1 million unemployment claims amid a surge of job losses.
About a third of the nation’s record 3.3 million unemployment claims are in California, where thousands of businesses have been forced to close following Newsom’s order for people to stay at home unless their jobs are deemed essential or they are buying food, medicine, visiting a doctor or exercising.
In Los Angeles, the number of virus cases jumped Thursday from about 800 to over 1,200 in 24 hours, which was directly correlated to an increase in the availability of test kits, public health Director Barbara Ferrer said. Deaths in the nation’s most populous county jumped from 12 to 21.
Based on a projection that each infected person spreads the virus to two others, the number of patients could quickly overwhelm hospitals, Ferrer said as she urged people to avoid exposure.
“We have to assume that the spread of COVID-19 is happening all across the county,” Ferrer said.
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