When the long awaited Cortellucci Vaughan Hospital opens in a few weeks, it will provide critically needed ICU beds to patients from across the region and GTA.
Premier Doug Ford announced today that the state-of-art hospital will be used as "a system-wide resource" to relieve pressures on surrounding hospitals due to rapid increases in hospitalization and ICU occupancy rates as Ontario continues to battle the second wave of COVID-19 cases.
The funding to support the temporary transition is part of the $125 million announced today that will immediately add more than 500 critical care and high-intensity medicine beds to hospitals in COVID-19 hotspots, including Toronto, Windsor, Durham, Kingston and Ottawa.
"This net new capacity will be critical until we are in a position to widely administer vaccines across the province," said Ford.
Mackenzie Health's Cortellucci Vaughan Hospital, the first new hospital in the province in three decades, will provide a total of 185 beds, including 35 critical care beds and 150 general medicine beds.
The emergency department at the hospital will not open to public on Feb. 7, as initially planned, Mackenzie Health CEO Altaf Stationwala said.
However, once COVID-19 capacity pressures have stabilized, the new hospital will provide care and services to patients from across the western York Region, including emergency and modern surgical services, as well as the York Region District Stroke Centre.
The latest modelling projects ICU occupancy to be as high as 1,000 beds by early February in the most severe scenarios, with deaths expected to double from 50 to 100 per day between now and the end of February, according the province.
As of today, Jan. 18, the critical care beds at Southlake Regional Health Centre in Newmarket are at 97 per cent capacity, with 32 of 33 beds occupied. The hospital is treating 61 COVID-19 patients, nine of whom are in ICU.
