B.C.’S Fraser Health Hospitals Will Put Covid Positive Patients In The Same Room As Fully-Vaccinated Patients

At Fraser Health hospitals, the patients who tested positive for Covid-19 now won’t have to stay separately from other fully-vaccinated patients as per the new guidance by the province’s largest health authority.

The new revised infection prevention and control recommendations have been introduced on January 4th. The Covid-19 cohorts are now only for the patients who require treatment for severe respiratory symptoms because of the virus.

About the new Omicron variant, the document said that it usually causes mild symptoms in fully-vaccinated people.

The Covid positive patients with mild or no symptoms will get their treatment in the unit that takes care of all their needs with precautions for droplets.

The guidelines also said that if a single-occupy room is not available for Covid positive patients, they can be placed in multi-bed rooms with at least two meters of distance between beds.

It further said that the patients with droplet precautions must not be placed in the same room with high-risk patients such as low-immunity patients, neonate patients, people with chronic cardiac or respiratory diseases, and more.

Covid-19 patients should only be placed in the same room as fully-vaccinated patients. While talking about the new changes in the guidelines, Fraser Health had stated that they will be offering a response to the cohorting issue on Thursday but did not make a comment at that given time.

When asked about whether the new guidelines are for other health authorities or especially for Fraser Health, Health Minister Adrian Dix said that there have been over 500 Covid-19 cases in Fraser Health hospitals and they accounted for nearly 10% of patients in some facilities. He added that when they have a record number of patients, it gets very difficult to manage their cohorting systems. He said the cohorting system is not always possible as many people are coming to the hospitals, not because of Covid-19 but because they have other diseases and they also test positive for the virus when their sample is tested at the hospitals.

The B.C. Hospital Employees Union said that the new policy indicates how bad the latest wave is. Spokesperson Mike Old said that what Fraser Health has decided about not cohortingCovid positive patients anymore is a total opposite of their previous practice. And it tells how serious things have become in their hospitals. He added that isolation and cohorting had been the main practice to control the disease in the province. And removing this practice should make the province think again about what it has done to protect its people.

Only on Thursday, there have been 891 Covid positive patients in B.C. hospitals. Nearly 119 patients among them have been placed in critical or intensive care. The Covid positive cases have decreased this Thursday. According to the previous prediction, the B.C. province may experience its highest hospitalization this week during the fifth wave.