As of Monday, the state reported more than 21,000 cases in Harris County, by far the most in the state. And cases are on the upswing.
Dr. Peter Hotez, dean of the national school of Tropical Medicine at the Baylor College of Medicine in Houston calls the numbers "frightening."
He says Houston is in a race with Phoenix to have the biggest outbreak in the nation and that they are seeing a surge in ICU admissions. "If those numbers continue to rise, in a week or so we're going to reach a dangerous level. That's significant because once you reach that point, that's when mortality levels go up because the ICU staff gets overwhelmed."Harris county recently implemented a four point, color coded Covid 19 warning system. Green is the best and red the worst. The system has sat at orange since it was put into place.
The county has a four color system, green, orange, yellow and red. They've been at the second worst level, orange since the system was implemented.
Hotez says "right now we're on a pretty steady pace to be in the red zone. That means implementing pretty aggressive social distancing. Yes, we have a mask order in place here but I don't think masks alone are what's going to turn this thing around."He recognizes that puts workers in a touch spot. "If it's a matter of protecting lives, I think we have to weigh that pretty seriously. Maybe there's an intermediate stand you can take at this point. Maybe you don't have to go to the full lockdown, but we're going to have to do things that go beyond masks."
