3 ms·
Problem is until we reach "herd immunity" it will overwhelm the healthcare system and many people die unneccessarily due to degrading quality of treatment.
by bflesch 7y ago
Problem is until we reach "herd immunity" it will overwhelm the healthcare system and many people die unneccessarily due to degrading quality of treatment.
- not_a_moth 7y agoIf won't overwhelm if the elderly or high risk are isolated and protocols are strict with that segment
- maccam94 7y agoThere is still risk for people outside the high-risk segment. Let's say that it's only 0.2% risk of death without a ventilator for the general population (based on https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2020-03-11/covid-19-risk-healthy-young-person https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2020-03-11/covid-19...). Let's say in the USA that we're talking 150M infected people who aren't high risk (65% or ~200M of the population is between 15-65). That's 300,000 people who will need ventilators (potentially for multiple weeks -- https://www.uchicagomedicine.org/forefront/prevention-and-screening-articles/wuhan-coronavirus https://www.uchicagomedicine.org/forefront/prevention-and-sc...). "The latest study available estimates there are about 62,000 ventilators in hospitals nationwide. That figure is seven years old — so the actual number could be higher." -- https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2020/03/14/815675678/as-the-pandemic-spreads-will-there-be-enough-ventilators https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2020/03/14/8156756... So yeah, you don't want all of those infections happening the same month or else hundreds of thousands of people will die.