AdventHealth infection control officer: COVID-19 hospitalizations declining, vaccine possible before end of year

September 17, 2020 — Dr. Vincent Hsu, an epidemiologist and AdventHealth’s infection control officer, lauded the declining hospitalization rates for COVID-19 during today’s AdventHealth Morning Briefing, and is cautiously optimistic that a vaccine may be approved before the end of the calendar year.

“We are at war with the virus,” Hsu said. “There is a pretty good possibility we may see a vaccine approved or at least get an Emergency Use Authorization by the end of this year. Things are looking good from that standpoint. But you’ve got to get this deployed … before we’ll see herd immunity, and that’s going to take many weeks and months.”

At the peak of the pandemic, AdventHealth had more than 700 COVID-positive patients hospitalized in seven Central Florida counties. The number has declined to roughly 270.

Highlights from the briefing include:

• Young people can get the COVID-19 virus: “We have seen young, healthy people put on ventilators, put on special therapies such as ECMO requiring a heart/lung bypass in order to get oxygen … I don’t know why we would want to take a risk with that. All of us need to do what we can to keep ourselves safe and avoid passing it on to others who may be susceptible.”
• Get a flu vaccine now while it is readily available: “You probably need to wait 2-3 weeks between a COVID-19 vaccine and a flu vaccine or vice versa. You can’t take them together. While there isn’t a COVID vaccine yet, there is a flu vaccine. Get it now.”

We encourage you to refer to the video on the Life at AdventHealth Central Florida page to pull direct quotes from Hsu. The video may be downloaded by following this link: https://vimeo.com/458946543#t=156s