Community Hospital reopened Jan. 4

LONG BEACH

Long Beach’s Community Hospital reopened on Jan. 4 and is ready to accept patients, according to hospital representatives.

The facility opened with 11 intensive care beds and space for 40 other patients as hospitals across the region scrambled to manage the ongoing surge of coronavirus patients, according to a news report in the Long Beach Press-Telegram.

Community Hospital will not initially treat coronavirus patients. It will focus on transfer patients with other health issues to help make room for more coronavirus-related care across the region.

Over the weekend, several area hospitals declared “internal disasters,” meaning they face extreme conditions that could put patients at risk, such as severe staffing shortages.

According to the Orange County Health Care Agency, 2,178 patients are being treated at Orange County hospitals, with 500 of them in intensive care units; in Los Angeles County, 7,898 patients were being treated, 1,627 of them in the ICU.

Southern California’s ICU bed capacity, as determined by a state formula, remains at 0 percent.

Orange County has 33 percent of its ventilators available, according to the agency.

All of the county’s metrics remain within the state’s most- restrictive, purple tier of the four-tier coronavirus monitoring system.

State officials have warned that January could be the worst month of the pandemic.

Community Hospital has hired more than 130 employees and continues to recruit physicians, nurses and staff for other positions.

More staffing will be necessary to eventually treat patients in all 158 beds that Community Hospital was licensed for before it shut down.

Officials expect, though, that Community Hospital’s emergency room department can reopen in March.

The hospital shut down in the summer of 2018, after its former operator, MemorialCare, determined a state-required seismic retrofit would be too costly for the facility to remain financially viable.