Six Nations on Grand River 'Current State Healthcare System Faced with Patient Capacity & Staff Burnout'

01.20.21. Six Nations of the Grand River community members were made aware of the current state of their healthcare system’s capacity, in terms of both COVID-19 and non-COVID-19 related patients. Hospitals are nearing critical capacity risking a collapse of the healthcare system.

In a recent press release, it stated, ‘The capacity of the health care system is approaching a breaking point of being overwhelmed. Deaths will exceed the first wave of the pandemic before the vaccine has time to take an effect, as projected by the new provincial modeling, if people wait to act at preventing COVID-19. Daily mortality is increasing and is expected to double if trends persist. It could go from 50 to 100 deaths per day between now and the end of February.’

Dr. Brown, an epidemiologist at the University of Toronto, noted this could cause COVID-19 to be the single greatest cause of death on a daily basis at that point, potentially larger than cancer and heart disease.

Hospitals in the Six Nations area are over capacity with ICU admissions, and two of their hospitals are experiencing COVID-19 outbreaks.

Surgeries and other procedures may be delayed or canceled, creating a backlog that could last for months or years. As their hospitals fill up, patients are being rerouted to the surrounding COVID-19 units, creating a scenario where a healthcare system could potentially collapse.

According to the SNGR statement, ‘If the spread of Covid-19 is not controlled, models show that Ontario could have 20,000 new cases each day by mid-February! That’s the worst-case scenario.’

In the United States, hospitals in numerous states such as Massachusetts, California, Nevada and Minnesota have implemented field hospitals. These facilities recruited nurses from other states and are desperately leaning on National Guard for support. In the SNGR region, Burlington, Ontario has the nearest field hospital which is in operation trying to address the healthcare strain.

SNGR reminds ‘each member has the power to help our healthcare workers in a community-wide effort to alleviate the healthcare system, by doing our part to slow the spread of COVID-19 before critical capacities are reached. Staying home has the potential to reduce risks of needing hospital health care.’

Six Nations on the Grand River COVID data as of Tuesday, January 26, 2021.

14 Active Cases

147 Total Cases

132 Resolved

1 Death