Illinois would need 38,000 more hospital beds if COVID-19 not tamed; cases statewide climb to 1,535

CHICAGO - Illinois health officials on Tuesday announced 250 new cases of COVID-19 and four additional deaths related to the virus.

The latest victims are a Chicago resident in his 50s, two Cook County residents both in their 60s, and a DuPage county resident in her 90s, according to the Illinois Department of Public Health.

There are now 16 people who have died in Illinois from COVID-19, and a total of 1,535 cases across 32 counties. Health officials announced that Grundy County was reporting its first case of the disease.

Governor JB Pritzker also announced Monday that Illinois is ramping up production of masks and hand sanitizer, among other personal protection equipment, to help combat the spread of COVID-19 in the state.

“In the face of the unprecedented challenges presented by COVID-19, the people of Illinois have stepped up once again: our innovative biotech companies and state-of-the art manufacturers are teaming up with the State of Illinois to ramp up production of Personal Protective Equipment,” Governor Pritzker said in a statement. “We’re not just waiting for in-state production. My administration continues to work day and night to scour the global supply chain. Illinois is acquiring PPE to compensate for what we haven’t received in our federal requests. But we are doing so while running up against obstacles that should not exist.”

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Illinois would have to double the number of available hospital beds in the next two weeks to treat COVID-19 patients if the coronavirus is not contained, Gov. Pritzker also said Tuesday.

The state would need almost 38,000 additional hospital beds, including more than 9,000 in intensive-care units, by April 6, in a worst-case scenario, the governor said at his daily briefing. And nearly 5,000 ventilators would be in demand — more than double what’s available in the state.

But Pritzker said efforts to tame the potentially deadly virus, such as his order to close non-essential businesses and keep people from leaving their homes unnecessarily, should temper those numbers. Despite the fiscal hardships, he said he opposed President Donald Trump’s suggestion that such social-distancing practices be lifted soon to spare the U.S. economy.

“We can revive our economy,” Pritzker said. “We can’t revive the people that are lost to this virus.”

Illinois can now process 600 tests daily in four state-run laboratories, up from 50 a day one month ago. Drive-thru, mobile and retail-store testing sites will produce hundreds more and commercial facilities are expanding capacity to 4,300 a day, Pritzker said.

But the rapidly spreading illness has outrun containment by testing alone, the governor said.

“We are beyond the moment where testing alone can be our primary weapon against this virus,” Pritzker said. “We can’t just test, we have to treat.”

More than half of the state’s 28,600 hospital beds are occupied, officials said. About 30% of the 2,200 ventilators is in use.

In a worst-case scenario, public health officials said that by Monday, the state would need an additional 3,300 beds and 400 ventilators. Just a week after that, the need would grow to 37,600 additional beds, of which 9,400 would have to be ICU, and 4,700 ventilators.

The Illinois Emergency Management Agency has sent tents to hospitals to serve as triage centers at 66 of the state’s 200 hospitals for evaluating potential COVID-19 patients. Officials from IEMA, the National Guard and the U.S. Army Corp of Engineers are investigating closed hospitals that could be temporarily re-opened.

Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot announced on Monday a plan to reserve thousands of hotel rooms for patients with mild cases of COVID-19.

And Pritzker said that his weekend call for retired medical professionals to step up yielded 180 online applications.

Pritzker reported that after speaking to Trump Monday, the White House told the public health department that the state would receive 300 ventilators and 300,000 protective face masks in the coming days.

It was also announced Tuesday that a woman in her 90s at a nursing home in DuPage County has died from COVID-19. Initially, 46 cases of coronavirus were reported at the Chauteau Nursing and Rehabilitation Center in suburban Willowbrook. The woman who died from the disease had underlying conditions before being diagnosed with the virus earlier this month.

Nationwide, more than 44,000 people have been diagnosed with coronavirus, according to the CDC website, making the United States the third worst-hit country in the world. The worst-hit country is China and the second worst is Italy.

Gov. Pritzker encouraged Illinois residents who are healthy to find ways to volunteer to help others during this time. Available opportunities include packing lunches, donating blood, delivering meals to the elderly, and serving food at homeless shelters. You can find ways to help at serve.illinois.gov.

On Friday, Gov. Pritzker issued a "stay at home" order for the entire state of Illinois, which will last until April 7.

Residents will still be able to take care of essential tasks, such as going to the grocery store, gas stations, and pharmacies, as well as take walks outdoors; just practice social distancing. Roads and highways will also remain open to traffic.

“We are doing all that we can to maintain as much normalcy as possible while taking the steps we must to protect our residents,” Governor Pritzker said in a statement last week. “I fully recognize that in some cases I am choosing between saving people’s lives and saving their livelihoods. But ultimately, you can’t have a livelihood without a life. This will not last forever, but it's what we must do to support the people on the front lines of this fight, and the people most vulnerable to its consequences.”

COVID-19 cases in Illinois have occurred in ages from younger than one to 99 years.

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Sun-Times Media Wire and Associated Press contributed to this report.