The Austin (Texas) Convention Center, now transformed into a field hospital, accepted its first three patients after opening Jan. 12, local NBC affiliate KXAN reports.
The facility currently has 25 beds and has the capacity to expand if needed, according to the Austin American-Statesman. It will accept noncritical patients from 11 counties across Central Texas.
The area's major hospital systems have repeatedly told Austin's health department that there are 200 ICU beds available for COVID-19 patients, according to KXAN. Projections from the University of Texas at Austin's COVID-19 Modeling Consortium anticipate the area will reach the 200-bed ICU capacity by Jan. 21. As of Jan. 14, 186 COVID-19 patients were in the ICU, according to data from Austin's health department.
As of Jan. 14, 14,052 people were hospitalized with COVID-19 across the state, according to data from The Atlantic's COVID-19 tracking project. Statewide hospitalizations hit a record Jan. 12, with 14,218 people hospitalized, according to the data.