WILKES-BARRE, Pa. — The mood at Geisinger Wyoming Valley is one of relief.
After months of uncertainty, finally, a glimmer of hope: there are no active coronavirus patients inside these walls.
But with that good news, comes a warning.
"It's very much too soon to start celebrating. This isn't over. We're kind of, you know, coming out of the woods, but we don't know if there's a big hole in front of us or not," said Geisinger Chief Medical Officer Dr. Gerald Maloney.
Dr. Maloney worries people are beginning to shake off the threat of the virus, and he says if we stop social distancing and mask-wearing, we risk ending up right back where we started.
"So the threat's still there, I do think that we have fatigue. And I do think that we're kind of, you know, how many people have I heard say 'I'm just so over this.' And I think that that's a significant problem that we're going to have to deal with. I also think that some people quite erroneously believe because it's nice weather we don't have to worry about that anymore."
Several states across the country have seen a spike in either coronavirus cases or hospitalizations since the beginning of the month.
Pennsylvania has not. Our numbers continue to decline. We asked Dr. Maloney why he thinks that is.
"Pennsylvania has done it right. I think that some of the other states just decided time was up and we are reopening you know with reckless abandon, and I think that the method with which Pennsylvania has done it with the red, yellow, green system and the phase reopening, I really do think that that has had a lot to do with it."
As for when the hospital plans to loosen restrictions in terms of visitors and wearing personal protective equipment (PPE), Dr. Maloney says he doesn't see those restrictions going away anytime soon.
"I don't see those going away I do see them under constant review, and I do see them potentially being revised and made a little less stringent, but I really don't think that we're going to have a return to again what we would have considered normal at Christmas time terms of hospital visitations, in terms of PPE, and things like that I think we're going to feel a lot more cautious going into the future. Does that future end there's a vaccine available? I don't know; I think it's too soon to call that."