Hundreds of hospital employees out of work

Harsin as its next head coach.

Thanks for joining us on this busy tuesday night -- i'm najahe sherman.

And i'm dan shaffer.

As you can see - we have a lot to get to tonight -- but we begin in our own back-yard.

Right now -- there are more than 460 coronavirus in- patients across the huntsville hospital system.

Nearly 100 of those are in the intensive care unit - and more than 60 are on ventilators.

While hospitals are trying to deal with the spike in patients -- what's making things even harder - is the number of employees the virus is forcing out of work.

Tongiht -- we know hundreds of huntsville hospital employees are out due to the virus.

Waay 31's sophia borrelli join us live from huntsville hopspital... she has details on the very concerning numbers we learned about today.

Sophia?

We know more than 300 employees in the huntsville hopsital health system are out right now because they either have the virus or have come into close contact with someone with the virus.

We also learned today - huntsville hopsital posted close to 400 online wanted ads in november - according to the alabama department of labor.

Doctor pam hudson the ceo of crestwood medical center says if the community doesn't help to stop the spread of the virus - the care we come to expect could change.

Dr. pam hudson, crestwood medical center ceo: "today we have people waiting to get into hospital beds because we don't have quite enough staff to accept them up on the units."

Doctor pam hudson the c-e-o of crestwood medical center says there is a significant shortage of healthcare workers to staff hospitals in our area.

Dr. pam hudson, crestwood medical center ceo: "over 180 county and 350 area employees that work at the hospitals are unable to work right now due to either their own illness or because of illness in their family or close contacts that have resulted in their quarantine."

She says because of this - frontline workers are stretched thin.

Dr. pam hudson, crestwood medical center ceo: "nurses and other staff members working in departments that they don't normally work in and it has caused most facilities to revise their routine care schedules in taking care of patients."

Commission chairman dale strong agrees.

Dale strong, madison county commission chairman: "this virus is directly impacting those who provide the care to this community, nurses in our hospitals, physicians and first responders.

We cannot afford to lose the caregivers and health care professionals who provide the care we need and especially for the critically ill with coronavirus."

Dr. hudson says if people in the community do not help stopping the spread of the virus - your healthcare could be impacted.

Dr. pam hudson, crestwood medical center ceo: "you run into some issues with care that's not able to be what we have come to know and appreciate in our healthcare system."

She says as a community we can help by wearing your mask - social distancing and sanatizing.

Dr. pam hudson, crestwood medical center ceo: "we can't afford to have that many people out because our work is, saves lives and takes care of people and helps prevent more complications.

So that absence of workers is really the issue and to fix that, we need to drive down the community transmission."

Health officials are worried about people getting together for the upcoming holidays... they are asking people to celebrate in small gatherings for the holidays.

Live in huntsville - sophia borrelli waay 31 news.