Cleveland Hospitals Place ‘Help Wanted’ Ad in Newspaper Amid Recent COVID-19 Struggles

It was a matter of time. Cleveland COVID-19 numbers have been the latest surge. There was a huge jump in cases affecting the Cuyahoga county area this past week.

The Cleveland Plain Dealer, one of Ohio’s largest newspaper, posted an ad in Sunday’s paper. “Help.”  The bottom line reads, “We need your help. We now have more COVID-19 patients than ever before. And the overwhelming majority are unvaccinated.”

Cleveland is home to the most popular hospitals for primary care, Cleveland Clinic and University Hospital. The U.S. News and World Reports ranked Cleveland Clinic as No. 2 in the nation. It came in first place for the 27th consecutive year for heart care.

The ad in the newspaper was sponsored by hospitals Cleveland Clinic and University Hospital, including MetroHealth, Summa Health, the US Department of Veterans Affairs and St. Vincent Charity Medical Center.

The brief message was removed Monday. It was a response to the Cleveland area’s recent surge in cases in the past week. Cuyahoga County, the center of Cleveland, has one of the highest percentages for COVID-19 hospitalizations within the state.

NBC News and Analysis says that Ohio is one of six states that accounts for more than half of COVID hospitalizations in the U.S. The medical director of operations at Cleveland Clinic says, “As we are seeing the cases rise, we are also seeing how sick these patients are, they are definitely sicker than we had experienced in the first few months of the pandemic in 2020.”

Due to the recent surge in cases, almost all Northern Ohio hospitals have paused surgeries. Gov. Mike Dewine announced in a press conference last Friday that COVID hospitalizations were the highest since December 2020.

The recent drive-in testing site shut down Tuesday in Cleveland after an overwhelming amount of people showed up to be tested. Gov. Dewine sent 1,000 members of the Ohio National Guard to service people.  Cars were flooding the streets at the W.O. Walker building on Euclid Avenue.

According to the Ohio Department of Health, a third of Cuyahoga County remains unvaccinated and fill majority of hospitals.