Liverpool intensive care units '90% full' as city braces for second wave

Intensive care units in Liverpool’s hospitals are more than 90% full, according to a local health leader, as the city braces for a second wave of COVID-19 infections.

Councillor Paul Brant, cabinet member for adult health and social care at Liverpool City Council, warned that hospital services were once again being forced to care for patients critically ill with coronavirus.

"Our intensive, critical care beds are filling up very fast,” he told BBC Radio 4's Today programme.

"The most recent figures I've seen suggest they are over 90 per cent full and our acute hospital trusts have occupancy levels of Covid-positive patients of over 250. At the current rate of increase, we would expect Liverpool to surpass the peak of the first wave probably within the next seven to 10 days."

Addressing the intensive care situation, he added: "They are not all Covid patients, I should say, but they are running very full and they are running with an increasing number of people who are Covid-positive."

He added: "It has become clear that the intensity of the demand on hospital services here in Liverpool is crowding out anything other than dealing with Covid."

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Source: The Independent, 14 October 2020