Rice University to begin housing Texas Medical Center employees

HOUSTON, Texas (KTRK) -- Rice University is stepping up its research, and even opening its doors to Texas Medical Center employees as the school begins its effort to defeat coronavirus.

Today the school is going to announce its research efforts that will help fight COVID-19, and at the same time the school is helping front line workers in a big way.

Rice will offer temporary housing for medical personnel who work in Texas Medical Center hospitals.

This will let the medical workers live nearby the hospitals so they can get rest, then get back to work without a commute.

The residential colleges still have about 50 students in them, but they will be relocated to make room for the medical center workers.

The two residential halls were picked because they can be isolated from the rest of campus.

The school already opened its parking lot to Med Center workers so they don't have to worry about taking public transportation and risk getting infected with the coronavirus.

Local officials are very concerned the next few weeks could see an explosion in area cases and they want us all to do everything we can to limit our contact with others.

"We are simply going to assume that at any given moment, our cases to spike up dramatically. But we want to take those necessary steps right now to flatten the curve to slow the progression," Houston Mayor Sylvester Turner said. "We have one single go to flatten it in such a way, that the changes that are coming in will not overrun our healthcare delivery system."

So far, local hospitals are not overrun, but the mayor says there could be 10 times the number of reported infected cases, and he urges we all stay in our homes as much as possible and keep up with social distancing.

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