A triage tent set up at Middlemore Hospital's emergency department should serve as a warning to the public to get out and get vaccinated, a nurses' union says.
A tent to triage patients entering Middlemore Hospital's emergency department. Photo: LDR
Staff have been triaging patients in the tent before they enter the ED since Monday as they prepare for an expected surge in Covid-19 cases.
New Zealand Nurses Organisation (NZNO) acting nursing and professional services manager Kate Weston said the changes at the south Auckland hospital, which has been ground zero in the Delta outbreak, were a "concerning development".
"We should be worried. If we can't vaccinate the population to the degree we need to, it's going to put massive pressure on existing health services," she said.
Weston said the tent was being used as an extension of the hospital's emergency department to help manage patients coming into the ED and reduce potential exposure events.
She said it made sense to try and better manage patient numbers as the hospital's ED was constantly under pressure.
"It's a strategy that has been used in other jurisdictions overseas. But this is an early warning sign."
There have been 1200 cases in the Counties Manukau region since the start of the Delta outbreak, more than a third of all reported cases in New Zealand.
Middlemore Hospital emergency department. Photo: LDR
Recent modelling carried out by Counties Manukau District Health Board showed if border restrictions were loosened for arrivals from countries with high Covid numbers, south Auckland could see between 1000 and 1400 cases a week - even if 90 per cent of the population was vaccinated.
A number of patients who went to Middlemore's ED have tested positive for the virus before or after leaving.
This has led to both staff members and staff being deemed contacts and having to isolate.
The most recent event, on September 30, saw 66 patients possibly exposed to the virus.
Counties Manukau DHB chief medical officer Dr Pete Watson said exposure events were an "unfortunate reality" with a pandemic like the coronavirus.
But he said to date no patients, or staff, had tested positive as a result of the events. That was due, in part, to high staff vaccination rates and the use of prevention and control measures at the hospital, he said.
The DHB already had one respiratory ward admitting Covid-19 patients, with a second ward on standby in case there was a surge in cases, he said.
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