Northwell Health CEO: ‘Doing Quite Well’ in Our New York Hospitals, Mild Illness Isn’t ‘The Worst Thing’ Since It Builds up Herd Immunity

On Tuesday’s broadcast of CNN’s “New Day,” Michael J. Dowling, the President and CEO of Northwell Health, New York State’s largest health system, said that Northwell’s hospitals are at less than 10% of their overall capacity and well below where they’ve been in previous waves. Dowling also stated that “There’s no crisis” and they’ll be able to handle the expected increase in hospital numbers and argued that “if people are not that sick and they’re not in the hospital, you’re building up herd immunity. So, from that point of view, it’s not the worst thing in the world, even though people are — may not feel well for a couple of days.”

Dowling said, “We’re doing very, very well, very manageable. There’s no crisis. So, let me just give you a little bit of perspective: We have, right now, about 460 patients in our hospitals. That’s less than 10% of our overall capacity. And this time last year, during the second wave, we had almost 1,000 cases this time last year and compared to where we were back in the first wave, we had 3,500 patients in our hospitals. So, when you look at the numbers today, they’re relatively modest. And they had been increasing relatively slowly since Thanksgiving. We do expect an increase now over the holidays, but it is all manageable. We will be able to deal with this. And I think it’s time for people to get — be a little bit calm, a little bit more rational. And while the positivity rate in the community is increasing dramatically, that does not mean that they automatically convert into hospitalizations. So, on the hospital side right now, we’re doing quite well, very manageable indeed.”

He added that there will be an increase in the positivity rate, “if people are not that sick and they’re not in the hospital, you’re building up herd immunity. So, from that point of view, it’s not the worst thing in the world, even though people are — may not feel well for a couple of days. So, if you get it and you don’t feel well for a couple of days, you can handle this. It’s a lot better, of course, than being in the hospital. I focus primarily on the hospital numbers. Because that’s where you don’t want to be.”

Dowling further stated that it’s important that hospitals follow proper precautions and that getting hospital workers and people in the community boosted needs to be a focus.

Follow Ian Hanchett on Twitter @IanHanchett

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