HARRISBURG — Pennsylvania has begun working to boost the number of hospital beds and organize “strike teams” of extra health care workers for hospitals and nursing homes struggling with surging COVID-19-related caseloads and staffing shortages, Gov. Tom Wolf’s office said Friday.

The Pennsylvania Department of Health and the Pennsylvania Emergency Management Agency are coordinating the undertaking after getting requests for help, Wolf’s office said.

The plans involve adding hospital beds within regions for 60 days to absorb patients from swamped hospitals. Additional medical support staff are to include physicians, respiratory therapists and registered nurses, Wolf’s office said.

Other staff will be sent directly to hospitals in need over the next three months. Certain nursing homes also will get additional beds, registered nurses and aides to allow hospitals in the area to more quickly discharge patients in need of long-term rehab or care.

In an interview Friday, Acting Secretary of Health Keara Klinepeter said the administration is working as quickly as possible to bring help and to bring as much as it can. The number of new beds will depend on the number of health care staff it can procure, Klinepeter said.

Klinepeter expects the plan to be in full operation by early February — when she expects rising hospitalizations to peak — although certain aspects could take effect before then, she said.

The department is in discussions with a staffing firm to bring health professionals from another state, but does not have a contract finalized, Klinepeter said.

Right now, the department is most concerned about the northeast and southcentral regions of Pennsylvania, Klinepeter said. The destination for the additional medical staff and beds will be guided by the latest available data when they arrive, she said.

In the meantime, Wolf and Klinepeter have urged people to get vaccinated and get a booster shot.

“Given the state that the hospitals are in right now, every Pennsylvanian plays a part in helping our heroic front-line health care workers, and that means people need to get vaccinated if they haven’t already,” Klinepeter said.

Klinepeter said people should wear masks in public, get tested if they don’t feel good and stay home if they test positive. Those who are having trouble getting access to a test should stay home and assume that they are COVID-19-positive, she said.

The one-day total of COVID-19-positive patients in Pennsylvania’s hospitals — more than 6,600, according to state data — is higher than at any other time during the pandemic, the Hospital and Healthsystem Association of Pennsylvania said.