In LA, ambulances circle for hours and ICUs are full. Is this what Covid-19 has in store for the rest of the country?

In Los Angeles, ambulances circle for hours and ICUs are full - STAT LA issued strict mask and stay-at-home orders so quickly last spring it beat the coronavirus back. But that early success did not last. Usha Lee McFarling STAT

LOS ANGELES — The situation here is dire. Every minute, 10 people test positive for Covid-19. Every eight minutes, someone dies. Ambulances circle for hours, unable to find ERs that can accept patients. Hospitals are running out of oxygen. ICU capacity is at zero. Patients lie in hallways and tents. Emergency room nurses have more patients than they can handle — sometimes six at a time.

The National Guard has arrived, not to help treat patients, but to manage the flood of bodies. As Los Angeles County approaches its millionth case of Covid-19, doctors describe their wards as war zones. Even the gorillas at the San Diego Zoo have gotten sick.

Just why did conditions deteriorate so badly in Southern California? And do the overwhelmed hospitals here offer a glimpse of what other regions may soon face as case counts rise steeply and a seemingly more infectious strain takes hold? Or did the unique and long-standing vulnerabilities of the nation’s second largest city conspire to ignite this current “surge on top of surge” that so many had feared but few predicted would get so bad that residents would be urged to refrain from entering grocery stores and, in some cases, to wear masks even while they are at home.

Like the city itself, the answers are complex — and also a bit perplexing.

When the novel coronavirus emerged in the U.S. last winter, LA County officials issued strict mask and stay-at-home orders so quickly they beat the virus back even as cases surged in New York and elsewhere. But that early success did not last.

Like the city itself, the answers are complex — and also a bit perplexing.