NUECES COUNTY, Texas — Nueces County Judge Barbara Canales is asking the state to try to get the federal government to send our area more than 500 hundred medical personnel to help out with the coronavirus surge.
Judge Canales said our health care system is on the brink of disaster if we do not change the direction we're headed.
She said every single one of us has to take the current COVID surge more seriously than ever. Right now, we have a 25% hospitalization rate and a severe shortage of medical professionals.
On Thursday morning, she made a request to the state to ask the federal government to send 545 medical workers to our area. She said that with our hospitalization rate being 50% worse than the state average and our hospitals struggling to find beds and staff, something needs to happen now.
Canales told 3News that she and Mayor Paulette Guajardo, along with the City Manager, held a phone call with the CEOs of our hospitals on Wednesday night over the worsening situation.
"We could get 120 beds, which we desperately need online, if we had the proper staffing," Canales said. "Many people have read that the state is going to assist in this effort but it's not enough. It's not enough because we are only going to get 200 people for our entire trauma region."
Judge Canales said this request is different than the call Governor Greg Abbott made to bring in 2,500 medical professionals to the state. Out of all of those workers, it's expected that we would only see maybe 50 to 75 of those health professionals being sent here.
She's trying to do everything she can to ensure our hospitals have what they need. She pointed out it's her number one priority right now.
She's also asking everyone to wear a mask and get back to doing all of those other COVID protection measures we took last year that proved to work.