Army’s Seattle Field Hospital Closes After 3 Days, Without Treating a Single Patient – By Richard Sisk (Military.com) / April 10 2020
The hastily built field hospital set up by the Army in Seattle’s pro football stadium is shutting down without ever seeing a patient, so the service can shift resources where they’re more urgently needed, Washington state Gov. Jay Inslee said.
Medical equipment at the CenturyLink Field Event Center is being returned to the Federal Emergency Management Agency for use elsewhere, but the governor cautioned against reading too much into the move.
“Don’t let this decision give you the impression that we are out of the woods,” Inslee said in a statement Wednesday. “We have to keep our guard up and continue to stay home unless conducting essential activities to keep everyone healthy.” Washington state saw the first coronavirus death in the U.S. on Feb. 29.
The state asked FEMA and the Army Corps of Engineers to convert the football stadium “before our physical distancing strategies were fully implemented and we had considerable concerns that our hospitals would be overloaded with COVID-19 cases,” Inslee said.
“But we haven’t beat this virus yet and, until we do, it has the potential to spread rapidly if we don’t continue the measures we’ve put in place,” he said.
Continue to article: https://www.military.com/daily-news/2020/04/10/armys-seattle-field-hospital-closes-after-3-days-without-treating-single-patient.html
