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Monday, March 09, 2020

Makeshift "hospitals"

Here's a thought about a solution to the coronavirus overwhelming our hospitals:

1. As we know, hospitals and related medical facilities are the ones primarily providing care for the coronavirus if it's serious enough. Hospitals have the personnel, equipment, and medications. Of course, this threatens to overwhelm hospitals if there are too many patients requiring care. For example, see this Twitter thread for one physician's perspective of how hospitals in Northern Italy are overwhelmed.

2. However, if circumstances warrant it, one solution could be to turn community centers and even people's homes into makeshift "hospitals" to care for those in need. A health care worker could come and visit when needed (e.g. to administer medications in a neighborhood). Medical engineers could develop and build the required equipment for homes and communities. Portable or at least more portable versions of what's in the ICU. In fact, health care workers could teach Americans what to do. A lot of what happens in supportive care is teachable even to someone without any medical background. After all, a nation that could virtually single-handedly supply the entire Allied war effort during WW2 with planes, ships, jeeps, clothes, boots, helmets, food, guns, and many other things could presumably be inventive enough to build and able enough to supply our own citizens with necessary medical equipment and so on. Heck, China built an entire hospital hospital in 10 days just for the coronavirus. Surely we can do even more! We have a fine history of American ingenuity and productivity.

3. That was the carrot; here's the stick. I realize this is far from ideal. It wouldn't be the best care for a patient. Perhaps under normal circumstances it would even justify law suits for poor standard of care for patients. In fact, it's quite possible there would be tons of medical errors and some or many people might even die from the medical errors. However, if the situation is dire enough, and hospitals are running at double if not triple capacity, and people are dying anyway, then what other choices are there? This is just a thought.

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