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Despite Gov. Steve Bullock calling a press conference about how Montana’s health care system is under stress from COVID hospitalizations, MT health officials won& #39;t release complete statewide numbers about hospital bed and ICU occupation and capacity. 1/8
Benefis in Great Falls was reported to be at 115% of capacity on Wednesday and Billings Clinic announced on Friday it had run out of room and had to convert a care home for patient overflow. 2/8
But it& #39;s difficult to get the complete picture across the state. The Montana Department of Public Health and Human Services has punted its response to a request for the information about how close to capacity all hospitals in Montana are getting. 3/8
"We are working on an effort to share that information in a way that would be meaningful. I should be able to give you an update next week." Jon Ebelt, DPHHS spokesman. 4/8
So they have the information, but are declining to release it because they are deciding how to present it to the public? And they& #39;re not promising to release it next week, just to update their progress. 5/8
Meanwhile, Montana is in the top 5 states in the nation in per-capita cases. 6/8
Schools cases are rising. In a week, COVID cases jumped from 278 to 432 in K-12 schools, and from 204 to 345 in MT colleges and universities. 7/8
A month before the election, there is no indication that Montana will add any new restrictions like there were in the spring. 8/8
