Crisis standards of care ended in Colorado amid falling COVID-19 cases

Crisis standards of care ended in Colorado on Thursday amid falling COVID-19 cases in the state. 

Colorado announced the move after it said hospitalizations and cases were declining.

“Crisis standards of care are an important tool to help manage health care delivery in times of acute crisis,” said Eric France, chief medical officer of the state’s health department.

“The decision to deactivate these standards is based on recent modeling and steadily declining cases and hospitalizations, suggesting the immediate strain COVID-19 places on Colorado should continue to decrease in the coming weeks. We recognize that health care systems continue to face challenges due to chronic staffing issues across the economy, and we thank health care workers for their service protecting Coloradans throughout the COVID-19 pandemic,” he added. 

The crisis standard of care for staffing was implemented back in November due to limited staff and an abundance of hospitalizations. The activation was used to assist hospitals in determining how to allocate workers.

In January, the standard was placed on emergency medical services so guidance could be instituted for how to care for patients with limited staff in emergency vehicles and how to interact with infectious patients.

Throughout the pandemic, Colorado has recorded almost 1.3 million cases and more than 12,000 deaths.