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Florida Hospitals and Nursing Homes Are Bracing for Hurricane Milton

More than 200 health care facilities in impacted areas are moving patients and residents in what the state’s chief of emergency medical oversight calls “our largest evacuation ever.”

As it makes landfall late Wednesday or early Thursday near Tampa, Milton is predicted to bring high winds and storm surges of 10 feet or higher to parts of Florida’s west coast and heavy rains throughout most of the peninsula. In preparation for the storm, the Florida Department of Health has deployed more than 600 ambulances and other emergency response vehicles and has set up 11 special-needs shelters for people with disabilities. In Florida, which gets hit with more storms than any other US state, hospitals have closed in the past because of weather disasters, but Mayhew says what is unusual this time is the high number of health care facilities that have evacuated ahead of Milton.

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