Hartford HealthCare (HHC) executives made a conscious decision early on to take a leadership role in the state with response to the COVID-19 crisis, President and CEO Jeff Flaks said Thursday.
“There is a choice to make in a crisis — we can wait, we can be late and kind of follow, or you can lead,” Flaks said. “We felt that that is who we are, a system with our resources. We needed to ensure that our state, our communities were really well protected.”
Flaks spoke at a roundtable Thursday with other HHC executives looking back at the hospital system’s experience a year after the first COVID-19 cases were recorded in the state.
Since that first case, the Hartford-based system has cared for 9,750 patients with the coronavirus at its seven hospitals across the state.
Other stats: 910,000 tests for COVID-19. More than 16,000 vaccinations a week right now, with the capacity for 80,000 with sufficient supply. More than $50 million spent on personal protective equipment (PPE) like masks and gloves. More than 8 million pounds of PPE used so far, an amount that could fill 100 18-wheeler trucks.
A shortage of masks and other protective equipment brought on a major crisis early on in the pandemic, Flaks said. In late March of last year, HHC debated whether or not it could afford to give masks to every person who entered the system’s facilities without risking its supply to front-line caregivers.
With only a 10-supply of masks on hand due to supply-chain disruptions, the health system knew it was a big risk to give out masks to all comers.
“We knew it was the right thing to do,” Flaks said. “We bet on the fact we could solve the other piece in the ensuing two weeks.” HHC became one of the first providers in the country to give out masks.
Since then, HHC has created a pipeline for PPE and now maintains a year’s worth of supplies in locations including a dedicated warehouse in Newington. The system has also become a manufacturer of PPE, sourcing raw materials and subcontracting with manufacturers, including spending $2.6 million with local suppliers.
Preparing for the worst was one lesson HHC learned in the last year, Flaks said.
“It was impossible to appreciate how unprecedented a worldwide pandemic would be,” he said. “This is crisis management.”
