MURRAY, Utah, Feb. 29, 2020 (Gephardt Daily) — Officials at Intermountain Healthcare have released the name of the Utah man now being treated for COVID-19 infection at Intermountain Medical Center in Murray.
St. George resident Mark Jorgensen was exposed to the novel coronavirus, as was his wife, Jerri Jorgensen, while vacationing aboard the Diamond Princess cruise ship off the coast of Japan in early February.
Jerri Jorgensen tested positive for the illness while the couple was being quarantined along with 3,000 other passengers and was taken to a local hospital, where she is recovering and is expected to be released within the next few days.
Mark Jorgensen decided to be evacuated to the U.S., where he tested positive for the virus while being quarantined at Travis Air Force Base outside Sacramento.
After he was hospitalized, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention asked Intermountain Healthcare in Utah to care for Mark Jorgensen, who was flown to Salt Lake City on Friday and has yet to show any symptoms of the deadly virus.
Intermountain Healthcare officials announced via Facebook they would be treating Jorgensen in a state-of-the-art isolation unit designed to contain and combat infectious diseases, including Ebola.
According to Dr. Mark Briesacher, chief physician executive at Intermountain Healthcare,“There are not many units like this across the country. At Intermountain Medical Center, we have a self-contained care unit that’s staffed by highly trained nurses and physicians to care for people who have infectious diseases like COVID-19.”
Briesacher said the actual unit is in a building separate from the IMC hospital campus, designed to minimize the risk of exposure to other patients and staff.
Another Utah couple, Tooele residents John and Melanie Haering, also were quarantined aboard the Diamond Princess. John was diagnosed with the disease while on board the ship and was evacuated to a hospital outside Tokyo. Unlike many, he suffered more extreme symptoms, including a bout with pneumonia. Thursday, however, John posted an emotional video on social media saying that he was heading home. His wife Melanie is back in the U.S. after being evacuated and quarantined at Travis Air Force Base on Feb. 15. She, too, is expected to be released.
Health officials say there have been no confirmed cases of COVID-19 inside the state of Utah, although 11 people were tested. None of them had the disease.
The results of four other tests had yet to be determined as of late Friday night.
Dr. Todd Vento, associate medical director of Intermountain Healthcare teleservices, said the decision to accept Jorgensen as a patient was not taken lightly, and was simply the right the thing to do.
“He’s a Utah resident,” Vento said in a Friday night news conference. “It helped him being with his family and closer to home after a long ordeal, and his wife still being in Japan. It was the right thing to welcome him here and show that we could provide the care for him.”
