SHORELINE, Wash. — Last week, the military packed up the field hospital they'd been planning at CenturyLink Field Event Center without ever seeing a patient as those resources were deployed to another area.
Even though the field hospital was packed up, Gov. Jay Inslee says we are not out of the woods yet and King County plans to move forward with isolation, recovery and quarantine sites around the county.
On Sunday, King County opened its first Assessment Center and Recovery Center in Shoreline. The plan is for the site to be ready for patients with a capacity of 140 people.
The AC/RC is different from other sites because they will offer basic health care and behavioral health care available onsite, but no medical procedures are happening on this site. The site is not a hospital and if someone needs that level of care, they will be transferred there for help.
The site will allow people to await test results and, if positive, give them a place to recover until they’re feeling better.
Most people will quarantine, rest and recover at home on their own, but the county has these facilities for people who can't do that or do not have a home.
The isolation and quarantine sites in Kent, Issaquah, and North Seattle/Aurora are all open and receiving guests who need a safe place to await their test results (quarantine) or isolate and recover if they are ill.
In Kent, the Central Avenue Motel will have a total capacity of 79 when it's fully repaired. In Issaquah, a former Holiday Inn is up and running to help and will be able to care for 98 people when it's fully repaired.
Some modular units in North Seattle sit on city-owned land and will have a total capacity for 23 people when everything is fully repaired.
Going into the weekend, there were 71 people at these locations.
Another AC/RC is planned for Bellevue and work started on an even larger facility in South Seattle in the SODO neighborhood.