With COVID-19 Surging at Baystate, Dr. Mark Keroack Encourages Vaccination
Despite having just 5.5% of the state’s hospital inpatient beds, Baystate Health’s four hospitals housed 18% of all inpatient COVID-19 cases in Massachusetts on Wednesday — and system President and CEO Dr. Mark Keroack is calling on the community to do its part, through vaccination and other measures, to help slow a recent surge in cases in Western Mass., mostly driven by the Delta variant. “Baystate Health has really been hit unusually hard by the fourth wave of the COVID-19 pandemic. We went from four cases on the first of July to, last weekend, having over 100 cases,” Keroack said at a virtual news conference on Thursday. “The last couple of days, things have gotten down into the 90s, and we hope that’s a good trend, but we’re really not sure.”