Texas seeks out-of-state medical help amid COVID-19 crisis

The Texas governor appealed for out-of-state medical help as COVID-19 hospitalizations soared, but he stopped short of reversing his ban on mask mandates even as leaders of the state’s largest cities and school systems imposed them.

Gov. Greg Abbott directed the state health department to use staffing agencies to find additional medical staff as the Delta variant overwhelmed hospitals statewide. Abbott also has sent a letter to the Texas Hospital Assn. requesting that hospitals postpone elective medical procedures.

President Biden recently called out Abbott and other Republican governors for blocking efforts to fight the pandemic.

“I say to these governors: Please help. But if you aren’t going to help, at least get out of the way,” Biden said.

But Abbott this week refused to reverse his executive order banning local officials from requiring masks or vaccines even as he faced challenges from Democrats leading the state’s largest cities and counties.

“The assertion that the governor of the state of Texas doesn’t have the authority to protect the rights and freedoms of Texans is just plain misguided,” Renae Eze, the governor’s spokeswoman, said in a statement Tuesday. “Texans have learned and mastered over the past year the safe practices to protect themselves and their loved ones from COVID, and do not need the government to tell them how to do so.”

Eze added that “removing government mandates, however, does not end personal responsibility or the importance of caring for family members, friends, and your community. Vaccines are the most effective defense against contracting COVID and becoming seriously ill, and we continue to urge all eligible Texans to get the vaccine. The COVID vaccine will always remain voluntary and never forced in Texas.”

On Tuesday, officials in San Antonio and surrounding Bexar County filed a lawsuit seeking a temporary restraining order so they can require masks in public schools and quarantine for unvaccinated students exposed to the coronavirus.

“The health of our students, especially those under 12 who are not eligible to be vaccinated, are being put at risk,” Nelson Wolff, Bexar County’s chief executive, said in a statement. “We need to continue to utilize every tool we have to combat the very contagious delta variant.”

In Texas, where about 45% have been vaccinated against the virus, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, more than 10,000 people were hospitalized with COVID-19 this week as some students returned to schools where masks and contact tracing were not required. The U.S. has been averaging more than 110,000 new infections a day, and 56,000 people were hospitalized with COVID-19 Tuesday, levels not experienced since the waning days of the winter surge.

Florida and Louisiana reported all-time record hospitalizations this week, while Arkansas registered its largest single-day increase in hospitalizations.

Austin Mayor Steve Adler, a Democrat, called the Texas governor’s refusal to respond to the crisis by imposing a statewide mask mandate “unfortunate.”