My employer received over $250mil from Covid relief. Our pay increases were stunted, because we are told the hospital was not profitable. so think of this...over $250mil given. Many supplies donated.....and I can go on and on. If there is a profitability issue....take it out on the Executives is what I say.
Employees are getting booster shots now....Pfizer.
Yup. Surgeries are hosptials' cash cow. When COVID hit, many hospitals only did emergency surgeries. The were allegedly losing tons of money. But as soon as they could do surgeries again, it was full on. In fact, they extended the hours for surgeries to get as much money back. And much like you said, our organization offered voluntary lay off and etc to cut costs. The hospital was literally running on a skeleton crew. Yet, they sure were front of the line to get that COVID relief money. Funny though, they did not seem to trickle down any funding to staff or etc. Instead, the administrated patted themselves on the back and told each other what a great job they were doing and gave themselves a fat bonus with the money. But oh hey, were gonna toss you a $250 bonus for working your ass off. It's ridiculous. And with hospitals overrun right now, they are crying for help. Not only for staffing, but also making sure the government keeps writing those checks. Maybe if they didn't treat everyone like shit, they would not have issues with retention.
It feels to me, we have had more hospitalizations this go around than the original COVID. I know the ER's are full. The ICU's are packed. I'm in Iowa and we have hospitals in Louisiana and Texas asking to transfer patients. That just seems insane.
The odd thing is this second wave is less discriminating. It's not just hitting the gero population and immunosuppressed. Teens, 20 somethings, and etc are all getting the Delta variant. I read somewhere the protein spike that they used to create the vaccine is no longer viable for the new strain. So, in a sense, the vaccine has less effectiveness that what was originally believed. Is it better than nothing? Yes. But I think the effectiveness of it is much overblown.
I also have read that those who have had the virus that have received the vaccine, have reported that their natural antibodies from the virus lower when in the body once they receive the vaccine.