There are 18 counties in Oklahoma now at "orange" in the state’s two-week old COVID alert system, despite some having new case levels two to three times the threshold for that level.
State officials clarified today counties will not advance to red, or "high risk" unless the entire state has also hit at least one of four criteria in a given week: less than 5% of ICU beds available, less than 5% of medical surgery beds available, less than 5% of ventilators available or fewer than five days of personal protective equipment available on average.
"I’ve had many conversations with both the state medical association and the Oklahoma Hospital Association. I think the system is not helpful at all at this point," said OU Medicine Enterprise Chief Quality Officer Dr. Dale Bratzler. "If you look at most of Oklahoma, it’s all the same color. It doesn’t tell you much of anything, and yet we know there are real hot spots in the state."
Health care organizations are calling on state officials to regionalize the COVID alert system to make it more useful.
"Honestly, I don’t think we’re going to transfer patients from an academic medical center, a St. Francis in Tulsa, out to some small rural hospital because they have a med/surg bed available," Bratzler said.
The Oklahoma State Medical Association is also disputing Gov. Kevin Stitt's repeated claim that Oklahoma has 5,000 COVID beds available.
"In fact, we only have 5,660 med/surg beds, 958 ICU beds, and 1,993 specialty beds (psych/rehab) total. A majority of those beds are already filled," OSMA President George Monks tweeted.
In order for a county to be at green or "new normal" on the state's COVID alert system, it must have fewer than 1.43 cases per 100,000 over the past week. To be at yellow or "low risk," counties must have between 1.43 and 14.39 cases per 100,000. Counties with more than 14.39 cases per 100,000 are considered orange, or "moderate risk."
In the latest update to the alert system, Tulsa County has 21.37 cases per 100,000. McCurtain County has the highest case rate, 48.05.
