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Mohave County board refuses to declare state of emergency

A hospital staff member attends to a patient in a COVID-19 intensive care unit on Jan. 6, 2021, at a hospital in Los Angeles.
AP, file
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AFP via Getty Images
A hospital staff member attends to a patient in a COVID-19 intensive care unit on Jan. 6, 2021, at a hospital in Los Angeles.

The Mohave County Board of Supervisors is willing to consider passing a resolution saying hospitals in northwestern Arizona face a staffing crisis due to the pandemic but has balked at declaring a county state of emergency over the same issue.

Medical officials on Monday asked the board to declare a state of emergency to help demonstrate to the public that dire conditions in hospitals were a reality and not a political issue.

Mohave County has one of the state’s lowest COVID-19 vaccination rates at 43.4% of eligible people, and its hospitals report being packed with unvaccinated virus patients.