My layman's understanding is that ventilation is a fairly complex art/science, and that modern ventilators have multiple modes that are effectively different co

My layman's understanding is that ventilation is a fairly complex art/science, and that modern ventilators have multiple modes that are effectively different control laws. I think that the pressure required to fill a patient's lungs is quite different in a COVID patient than a normal patient, because the disease has caused huge flow restriction in the lungs. I think that generally you want to control flow rate, because you need to get a particular respiration rate, and the lungs can hold a certain amount of air. You then use whatever pressure gets that respiration rate. If the pressure or flow rate is too high, I think that that can cause lung damage, so one option is to increase the oxygen concentration in the air you're delivering. My understanding is that the downside is that although this will lead to more oxygenation, it doesn't help any with removing CO2. If you reach this limit, the only option is then ECMO.