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IU Health-BMH President: Indiana COVID cases could soon see another increase

By Stan Sollars, IPR News | Published on in Health, Local News, Science
IU Health Ball Memorial Hospital (Photo provided)

The president of IU Health’s East Central Region believes we’re a few weeks away from both another spike in COVID-19 cases and increased hospitalizations from the virus.

Dr. Jeff Bird says as the case count in Indiana has already increased recently, the Muncie hospital has seen a mild increase in COVID patients.

“With the increased number of positive cases – the hospitalization usually lags about 10 days to two weeks – so, we know the next two to four weeks, we’re going to see an increased number of hospitalizations.”

Positivity rates are spiking in northern Midwest states like Minnesota, Wisconsin, and Michigan.  Bird believes Indiana is a few weeks behind, so anticipates even higher positivity rates in Indiana in the next two to four weeks.

Read More: Indiana Department of Health overhauls its COVID-19 dashboard

Bird says people have been feeling pandemic fatigue for a while, but says it’s important to pay attention to case spikes.

“Everybody is so tired of masking and social distancing and not being together with family.  And it’s not that you can’t do some of those things now.  It’s so much safer if you’re fully vaccinated, and we still have a very, very large contingent of people who are not vaccinated.  So that puts everyone at risk.”

Bird says that in Indiana, health officials are still seeing about 5,000 people a week coming in to get their first COVID vaccine dose.

Hear the full Morning Edition interview here: