A Macon County resident who was recently diagnosed with COVID-19 has died, according to Macon County Public Health.
The person, whose name is not being release to protect the family’s privacy, was the first county resident diagnosed with COVID-19. Two other people in the county who tested positive for the coronavirus that causes COVID-19 were visitors from out of state.
The deceased was over the age of 65 and had underlying medical conditions, according to the health department.
“Our deepest sympathies are with the family and loved ones at this time,” said Carmine Rocco, Macon County interim health director. “We want to reiterate the importance of citizens staying home and practicing social distancing until further direction from our government and health leadership.
“Our message to those who are full-time residents, part-time residents, or visiting Macon County: Stay at home. Stay safe. Practice social distancing. Quarantine if you have travelled. Limit your trips outside of your home to necessities.”
If you believe you may have COVID-19, call Macon County Public Health at 828-349-2517. The call center is open Monday through Friday from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m.
Getting ready at Angel
Karen Gorby, CEO of Angel Medical Center, said she is confident that the hospital is prepared for the expected surge of COVID-19 cases.
“We look at it in three different stages, then we have a different set of plans linked to each stage, where the third stage is 200 percent of our normal [patient] volume,” she said. “We put together the plans and matched them with our staffing model, and supplies and equipment. We also matched it with providers. At stage one, [we are] just waiting to see what happens and have all of our plans ready to implement.”
Gorby said that Angel is benefitting from resources provided by HCA, its parent company.
“We’re very fortunate to have access to all the resources provided by one of the biggest health-care systems in the country,” she said. “For some independent rural hospitals, that is a concern. When they’re in a crisis, they have to be ready to stand alone. It would be a very scary situation. It’s very different for us than it is for an isolated hospital.”
HCA and its hospitals are also providing personal protection equipment (PPE) to Angel.
“We’ve received our allocation of PPE that have been ordered,” Gorby said. “In Asheville we have a cache of different equipment. When we start seeing the surge, they’ll match that with equipment for that surge. I feel really good at this point about our plan and our access to supplies and equipment.”
Warren Cabe, the Macon County Emergency Services director who is heading up the county’s coronavirus efforts, said last week that Angel Medical Center and Highlands-Cashiers Hospital had seven ventilators between them.
“We look at the number of ventilators across the system as being available across the system,” Gorby said. “Even though we have some allocated, if we need more, we have access to more.”
Angel will also work with Mission Hospital in Asheville to allocate patient beds. The most critical patients will go to Mission. If Mission becomes crowded, patients there who are in less serious condition may go to Angel.
As a critical care facility, Angel is limited to caring for 25 in-patients. That rule has been relaxed in the face of the coronavirus, Gorby said.
“We can surge up to as many beds as we need to care for the community,” she said.
Angel was scheduled to put up a triage tent on Tuesday, April 7 in order to improve the screening process for people entering the hospital.
“We screen every patient before they enter the system,” Gorby said. “We’re going to screen outside. They won’t come in at the main entrance or at ED but through a back door, then get assessed and have any diagnostic workup and determine if they can go home or if they need a higher level of care.”
Angel is maintaining restrictions that prohibit visitors except for one visitor at a time for pediatric cases. The hospital also implemented a policy that requires everyone in the hospital to wear a face mask.
“So when our ED gets busy, we have levels of surge that we will expand to, and we have adjacent spaces within the hospital as well as a building across from the hospital that we can use in case we get a huge volume out of ED and outpatient surging,” Gorby said.
William Hathaway, chief medical officer at Mission Hospital, said Western North Carolina has relatively little impact, but that is likely to change.
“We have, fortunately, to this point in time, [been] on the trailing edge of the epidemic,” Hathaway said. “We have seen some cases in our community and they continue to trickle in. I think Buncombe County’s surpassed 20 cases right now, and there’s been some cases in Macon, in Jackson County and a few others, but we’re still probably less than 50 total cases in Western North Carolina. And the vast majority of these have not been hospitalized. We’ve had five patients hospitalized at Mission Hospital to date, and so we’ve been very fortunate.
“Just to be honest, and not to create panic, but we will see more deaths in our community,” Hathaway said.
“We are looking at our bed availability,” Hathaway said. “We’re prepared here at Mission Health to take on the sickest of the patients in Asheville, by converting our non-intensive care units into intensive care unit beds. … We have ample supply of ventilatory care right now that we think will be able to meet the need. It’s unpredictable, and we can’t make promises, but I want people to feel reassured that we are working diligently on this daily to make sure that we have beds, we have ventilators, we have PPE, and we have staffing plans that will gear us up to help meet the surge, whatever it proves to be as we go forward.”
Rep. Kevin Corbin has been updating his constituents on the status of the coronavirus. On Monday, he shared a report citing the situation in North Carolina.
As of Monday, there were eight cases and one death in Cherokee County, three cases in Clay County, three in Haywood, 31 and one death in Buncombe, one case and one death in Macon, one in the Qualla Boundary, and none in Graham, Swain and Jackson counties, Corbin reported.
As of 11 a.m. Tuesday, April 7, the N.C. Department of Health and Human Services reported 3,221 laboratory-confirmed cases and 46 deaths in the state. That data can be tracked at ncdhhs.gov/divisions/public-health/covid19/covid-19-nc-case-count.
“We believe our residents are in good hands as the county braces for a surge in cases,” said Cabe, who is heading up the county’s efforts to battle the coronavirus.