As coronavirus cases continue to surge in Alabama, Birmingham Mayor Randall Woodfin urged residents and businesses to stay vigilant in their efforts to limit spread of the virus.
“Each of us has a responsibility to take care of ourselves,” Woodfin said in an online press conference Friday morning. “We also have a responsibility to take care of our families. But we also have a responsibility to take care of our neighbors.”
Alabama has reported all-time highs in number of COVID-19 cases and hospitalizations in the days following the Thanksgiving holiday, and experts worry that people who may have caught the virus over Thanksgiving are just beginning to show up in the statistics. They worry another surge in on the way.
Deputy Jefferson County Health Officer Dr. David Hicks said that hospitals in Jefferson County and other parts of Alabama are being stretched to their limit. Hospitals in some parts of the state have postponed elective surgeries or other non-emergency procedures, and others may be forced to do the same.
“Our hospital systems, the beds are filling up, the ICUs are filling up, they’re running out of space as we speak,” Hicks said. “Our worst fears are happening right now.”
Hicks said hospitals are doing what they can to “shift beds around” and care for the surging number of COVID patients -- as well as other patients with non-COVID ailments -- but that those shifts can only accomplish so much.
“Our healthcare workers are spending tireless hours working in the field and they need the general public to realize that there is it’s really getting dire,” Hicks said.
The recent numbers for the most populous county in Alabama have not been good.
“Unfortunately, here in our county, we have over 35,000 cases of COVID-19,” Hicks said. “We just passed a milestone that we don’t like; over 500 deaths in our county. That’s way too many. One is too many. We’re averaging 326 cases per day in our county. That’s unacceptable.”
Alabama has a statewide mask order requiring people to wear facemasks in public settings, and Woodfin urged Birmingham business owners to do their part by requiring customers to follow the order.
“If you are a small business owner in the city of Birmingham, if you are a manager of some form of a public store, I expect you enforce the state’s facial cover law,” Woodfin said. “You need to make sure that the person who walks into your establishment‚ that they are abiding by the state’s law.”
Woodfin said city employees will continue working from home where possible, and those who were furloughed because of budget cuts will return to work Monday, as scheduled, even if that means returning to work from home. He urged everyone else to remain vigilant despite COVID fatigue.
“We all know someone who has an underlying condition or pre-existing condition, someone in our network of family or friends who we go to church with, who we work with,” Woodfin said. “Someone who has an existing respiratory issue, an underlying health issue, diabetes or anything else that, if they catch the COVID, they may not react the same as you or I would.
“Remember that as you go about interacting with other human beings.”
Woodin was also joined at the press conference by UAB Chief Information Officer Curtis Carver, who encouraged Birmingham residents to download and use the GuideSafe exposure notification app. Available from the Apple or Google app stores, the app uses Bluetooth signals to determine if another person’s phone has been in close contact to your phone. The app was developed at UAB in collaboration with the Alabama Department of Public Health and Birmingham-based MotionMobs, within the Google and Apple operating systems.
If that person later tests positive for COVID-19, users who have downloaded and activated the app will be notified that they have had a potential exposure and that they should get tested themselves. The app does not record locations or other personal identifying information, but uses anonymous Bluetooth “keys” to register devices that are closer than six feet for 15 minutes or longer.
Carver said Alabama’s version of the app has been downloaded almost 175,000 times, the second most of any state’s app that is participating in the program, and that 456 confirmed positive results have been reported to the system, notifying thousands of people about potential exposures.
“You just download it, accept notifications and start your peace of mine,” Carver said. “You’ll also be a citizen hero, doing your part to protect those around you.”
You can watch the full briefing in the window above.