An Alabama man, Ray DeMonia, who suffered a cardiac event died on September 1 after being turned away from 43 hospitals. Due to the surging number of COVID cases in the area, the cardiac ICUs in each hospital that emergency staff called were already at capacity.
Finally, a bed was found for DeMonia in Meridian, Mississippi — 200 miles away from his home. Sadly, he died there just days later.
In the wake of his death, his family is urging people to get vaccinated against COVID-19. "In honor of Ray, please get vaccinated if you have not, in an effort to free up resources for non COVID related emergencies," the obituary reads. "He would not want any other family to go through what his did."
Hospitals in both Mississippi and Alabama have been overrun with COVID patients in recent weeks. It's no big surprise that the rates are surging, as their vaccination numbers are the worst in the country. Earlier this month, Mississippi just edged out Alabama for the lowest rate.
Still, for families who can't get emergency care for their loved ones, it feels shocking to hear. DeMonia's daughter, Raven, told The Washington Post about her reaction to hearing that there were no beds for her dad.
“It was like, ‘What do you mean?’” she said when she found out her father was being airlifted to a Mississippi hospital. “I never thought this would happen to us.”
Scott Harris, head of the Alabama Department of Public Health, said on Friday that COVID rates seem to be stabilizing. Still, the situation in hospitals is deeply straining.
“We continue to have a real crisis in Alabama with our ICU bed capacity,” he said.
“We’ve never been here before. We are in truly now in uncharted territory in terms of our ICU bed capacity,” said Alabama Hospital Association President Dr. Don Williamson last month. What's most troubling is that the situation we're still seeing in states like Alabama and Mississippi is now highly preventable.
Back in July, Alabama's Republican governor, Kay Ivey, spoke out forcefully against people who are still refusing to get vaccinated. When asked what it would take to help convince people to get their shots she said, "I don't know, you tell me!"
“Folks are supposed to have common sense," Ivey continued. "But it’s time to start blaming the unvaccinated folks, not the regular folks. It’s the unvaccinated folks that are letting us down."
