All Ventilators Delivered To NIISSA Saturday Are At Area Hospitals
Saturday at 5pm UPS delivered the first shipment of much needed ventilators made by General Motors & Ventec to The Gary Airport also dubbed as The District 1 Headquarters / NIISSA Command Center. 34 ventilators were delivered for District 1 from the federal government program for much needed hotspots across the US.
The first 5 ventilators went to Franciscan Michigan City where they will be utilized for the growing hotspot at Westville Prison in LaPorte County. The other remaining ventilators were shipped to the other 16 hospitals, two per hospital in District 1, according to PIO Lori Postma of The Healthcare Coalition / NIISSA . Confusion with the state numbers being put out by The Indiana Department of Health of a large percentage of ventilators available daily statewide is just that, statewide. This doesn’t count the area hotspots specific where numerous ventilators are currently in use such as Lake County, over other counties that might not need them, Postma told RNS. “While the numbers may be accurate they do not depict the picture of what’s happening here,” Postma said. “They are also converting anesthesia machines into ventilators and utilizing emergency disaster ventilators in those numbers,” Postma stated. Local hospitals were given small emergency ventilators probably a decade ago through a grant and each hospital had to bring them up to current standards to meet guidelines. “These older ventilators are very small, almost the size of a bag of sugar,” Postma said.
Frank Mrvan mentioned on WJOB today that NIISSA received a donation of 18 refrigerated trailers, these trailers were offered with no cost to local counties. The hospital groups will repurpose these as temporary morgues in the event they are needed to supplement hospital and county coroner morgues in the 5 counties that make up District 1.
NIISSA was able to donate some trailers to other surrounding counties as well as the state to help with this pandemic.
Photo – Paul Goddard – RNS
