4 ms·

And the equipment...my understanding is that ventilators are critical for those who have severe cases. Can't just magically wish for tens of thousands of ventil

• yulaow 7y ago
  In italy one and the only factory of ventilators which was selling worldwide 250 units per month is now producing 500-600 per month exclusively for the italian hospitals (and past orders not yet sent abroad were blocked bt the government and redirected to italian hospitals) for the next ten months. https://youtu.be/7Iz5tWb9f8A https://youtu.be/7Iz5tWb9f8A [hoping the english subtitles work]
  • maxerickson 7y ago
    The translated subtitles seem reasonable. I had to go in and switch it to translating to English.
• raphaelj 7y ago
  Most hospitalised people will only need non invasive respiratory support and surveillance. I guess these cases could be handled by purposely trained health workers.
• gpm 7y ago
  But we can just build them. At least we could if we weren't instead shutting down our economies. Look at the manufacturing ramp up that occurred during WWII for example.
  • jeremyjh 7y ago
    Do you actually believe there is a ventilator factory somewhere that has been shutdown?
    • nicoburns 7y ago
      How difficult can it be to build one? Ok, we're not going to have one tomorrow. But how about in 3 months time? 6 months?
      • jschwartzi 7y ago
        I worked for a ventilator startup for a few years, and it took us about 18 months to get our line to the point where we could make first articles built to manufacturing instead of prototype processes. These first articles then continued to develop some performance problems which needed to be rectified over the following year or so. This was starting from an empty building, which is where you'd be even if you retrofitted a ventilator factory into a car factory, because none of the tools in a car factory are precise or accurate enough to build or test a ventilator.
        • jeremyjh 7y ago
          Yes but if you start with complete specs for a well-established production model, as well as complete specs for all the tooling and assembly machines you've got a completely different scenario. If you take experienced machinists off another line to spin it up with consulting from people who are currently building it, I would guess you could do something in six months or so. I mean, IBM built M1 Garands in WWII.
          • fma 7y ago
            Yes that's be doing done now "More than 60 manufacturers have been sent a blueprint for making up to 20,000 ventilators to treat coronavirus patients, “at speed”, as Boris Johnson called on British industry to help the government prepare for a surge in cases." https://www.theguardian.com/business/2020/mar/16/vauxhall-owner-psa-car-shuts-european-plants-amid-coronavirus-fears https://www.theguardian.com/business/2020/mar/16/vauxhall-ow... I work for a very large global manufacturer w/ a presence in China, and does not produce medical equipment. My Chinese family told me (so take it w/ a grain of salt) they said 'Hey I heard your company is building ventilators to help out' and I said I don't know. My gripe is why the other countries didn't do it too since we had more lead time. Infection rates are exponential...waiting too long to take action will cause more deaths.
• bad_user 7y ago
  From my understanding, on Italy the mortality rate of those that are hospitalized is 25%, however the mortality rate of those that are put on invasive ventilation goes over 95% (can't find the source), so for most it's basically a death sentence.
• stefan_ 7y ago
  Germany ordered 10k from Drägerwerk: https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-draegerwerk-ventil/germany-italy-rush-to-buy-life-saving-ventilators-as-manufacturers-warn-of-shortages-idUSKBN210362 https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-draege... If your country doesn't have a local manufacturer for these things, it seems you are kinda out of luck.
  • kiney 7y ago
    And Dräger already announced, that they going to extend their factory in Lübeck