How many Missouri are available to battle COVID-19?

Of Missouri’s roughly 10,800 hospital beds, about 3,700 – or 35 percent – are currently available to help fight the coronavirus. During Saturday’s press briefing, Missouri Health Department Director Randall Williams said the state is now publishing daily totals of hospital beds and ventilators available statewide.

“And so that’s incredibly important as we use our testing data and look at our admissions to look at surge capacity, especially in those communities that we have more cases, such as in the St. Louis area, the Springfield area and to that extent in Jackson County,” said Williams.

The latest data shows that Missouri has about 1,100 available ventilators. The Show-Me State has about 150 hospitals and state and federal officials having been reviewing several sites as possible makeshift hospitals if Missouri runs out of bed space at traditional hospitals.