“It’s been over 600 days of fighting and we’re tired,” Tracie Hayes, a COVID-19 surge unit nurse manager at Mount Carmel Health System, told WCMH in Columbus. “We’re asking for your help.”

The help they need is for Ohio residents to be doing everything they can to slow the spread of the coronavirus. We all know the drill.

To do your part to combat this potentially deadly illness, you need to get vaccinated. If you choose the Moderna or Pfizer vaccine, get both of the initial doses. Then, after five or six months depending on the version you choose, go get a booster shot.

Those who choose the Johnson & Johnson vaccine instead should get the first dose and then a booster at the appropriate time.

Even if you have been vaccinated, you should also wear a mask in public, practice social distancing and avoid large crowds and gatherings.

It is frightening to note that WCMH reported health officials in the Columbus areas said they do not have the manpower to staff another temporary hospital site like the one utilized in 2020.

The Buckeye State’s medical community is running on empty.

“They’re asking me for a miracle. And I am so sad … because that’s all I’m seeing around me — are miracles everyday. We asked and prayed for people to save our lives. And they gave us a vaccine,” Hollis said.

We are going on two years of COVID. Health officials are begging us to do what we can to make sure there is an end in sight.