By NICK GOSNELL
Hutch Post
HUTCHINSON, Kan. — Coincidentally, as of information provided to Hutch Post on Wednesday morning, there have been deaths of 12 Reno County residents from COVID-19. There have also been 12 deaths of patients at Hutchinson Regional Medical Center due to COVID-19. Only six of the deaths at HRMC are from Reno County residents. The other six are residents from other counties. Neither the county or the hospital is releasing demographic information on deaths.
"We are receiving patients from other parts of the state," Welch said. "Other hospitals are transferring in, or other patients are choosing to be here. Or, it's very possible, I don't know this for sure, but its very possible they could have been on their way to Wichita or somewhere else and ended up here."
Though Welch didn't have numbers on how many people were intubated before they died, he said he knew not all of them were.
"People don't necessarily need to be on a ventilator before they expire," Welch said. "This disease can happen very fast. I know, anecdotally, we had one on the floor that was not intubated that expired."
The point is that even though the number happens to match right now, it likely won't for long. The Reno County Health Department's dashboard is the best source for the death count of Reno County residents.