Conservative radio host Rush Limbaugh claimed some members of the media were exaggerating the effect the coronavirus pandemic has had on hospitals.
Limbaugh, who has previously demurred at the health experts advising President Trump and his team, questioned during his radio show on Tuesday the reporting on hospitalization numbers throughout the country. He also singled out the Drudge Report during his monologue.
“One of the things that interests me is the hospitalization numbers,” Limbaugh began. “Because if you look at Drudge, if you look at the drive-by media, you would believe there is not a single hospital bed in this country, right?”
“You have been led to believe that every hospital is overflowing,” he continued. “That dead bodies are in body bags and refrigerated trucks that are being parked off to landfills, or whatever. I mean, some of the most incredible reporting I have seen, and it is in New York, it is in Washington, D.C., Maryland, the eastern seaboard states. There’s just not a hospital bed around, the hospitals are overflowing.”
He then said that if someone needed to go to the hospital, they might as well “pack it in and die.”
Limbaugh did not acknowledge that approximately a dozen states have taken steps to create additional field hospitals to treat the overwhelming flow of patients. Sports stadiums and convention centers have been repurposed, while the Army Corps of Engineers has looked into building temporary structures. Additionally, two Navy ships have been deployed to help alleviate the burden on hospitals.
