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Why didn’t the hospital system collapse because of the flu?

by woah 7y ago

jojo2000 7y ago
It is because of the consequences of covid-19 on the lungs of some people, which needs intensive care and specialized equipment to cure them, that is rare (ventilators etc.).
- easytiger 7y ago
  People are conditioned by experience to not present to hospital with mild respiratory symptoms. As they get older it gets more common and you still apply the same rules. Often too late by then to do anything other than ventilate.
- concerned_user 7y ago
  People forget that ventilator means not only the machine itself, but you also need couple of doctors - anesthesiologist in the least and nurses that have to keep watch. Person on the ventilator needs to be partly paralyzed to not interfere with the machine. I do not know how many staff on average is needed per patient but it is a significant number. Also the length of time that people stay on it, with covid-19 it seems to be 2-3 week so bed and staff turnover is slow, which meant you need many more people that are available. ICU "bed" is a virtual term, it not only means the physical availability of ventilator, but also staff.
  - jschwartzi 7y ago
    Just a nitpick but a regular ventilator doctor that isn’t necessarily qualified to administer anesthesia is a Pulmonary specialist. They are generally the doctors prescribing the ventilation therapy. Below them are Respiratory Therapists who have a core of general knowledge and training for ventilation therapy. The RT is the person who administers the therapy and manages the equipment in the day to day. You don’t need to have run anesthesia ventilators to run regular ventilators. Anesthesia delivery is generally considered a different animal.
vonmoltke 7y ago
Based on the CDC's numbers for the US[1], less than 2% of seasonal flu cases require hospitalization at all. This disease is at about 20% (based on detected infections). Even if 75% of infections are really undetected and asymptomatic, we're still looking at about 3 times the number of hospitalizations as seasonal flu. [1] https://www.cdc.gov/flu/about/burden/preliminary-in-season-estimates.htm https://www.cdc.gov/flu/about/burden/preliminary-in-season-e...
- easytiger 7y ago
  This doesn't make sense. The flu figures are statistically derived. The cv2 figure is derived from literally actual test cases only, which represent a tiny tiny tiny subset. They cannot surely be compared, unless I'm missing something
acegopher 7y ago
Because the health care system is built with those estimates in mind. It's the same with electricity infrastructure on climatologically hot days. The infrastructure is only built to handle a certain normal peak load. COVID-19 like a heat wave, is abnormal.

Why didn’t the hospital system collapse because of the flu?

by woah 7y ago

Why didn’t the hospital system collapse because of the flu?

jojo2000 7y ago

It is because of the consequences of covid-19 on the lungs of some people, which needs intensive care and specialized equipment to cure them, that is rare (ventilators etc.).

easytiger 7y ago
People are conditioned by experience to not present to hospital with mild respiratory symptoms. As they get older it gets more common and you still apply the same rules. Often too late by then to do anything other than ventilate.
concerned_user 7y ago
People forget that ventilator means not only the machine itself, but you also need couple of doctors - anesthesiologist in the least and nurses that have to keep watch. Person on the ventilator needs to be partly paralyzed to not interfere with the machine. I do not know how many staff on average is needed per patient but it is a significant number. Also the length of time that people stay on it, with covid-19 it seems to be 2-3 week so bed and staff turnover is slow, which meant you need many more people that are available. ICU "bed" is a virtual term, it not only means the physical availability of ventilator, but also staff.
- jschwartzi 7y ago
  Just a nitpick but a regular ventilator doctor that isn’t necessarily qualified to administer anesthesia is a Pulmonary specialist. They are generally the doctors prescribing the ventilation therapy. Below them are Respiratory Therapists who have a core of general knowledge and training for ventilation therapy. The RT is the person who administers the therapy and manages the equipment in the day to day. You don’t need to have run anesthesia ventilators to run regular ventilators. Anesthesia delivery is generally considered a different animal.

vonmoltke 7y ago

Based on the CDC's numbers for the US[1], less than 2% of seasonal flu cases require hospitalization at all. This disease is at about 20% (based on detected infections). Even if 75% of infections are really undetected and asymptomatic, we're still looking at about 3 times the number of hospitalizations as seasonal flu. [1] https://www.cdc.gov/flu/about/burden/preliminary-in-season-estimates.htm https://www.cdc.gov/flu/about/burden/preliminary-in-season-e...

easytiger 7y ago
This doesn't make sense. The flu figures are statistically derived. The cv2 figure is derived from literally actual test cases only, which represent a tiny tiny tiny subset. They cannot surely be compared, unless I'm missing something

acegopher 7y ago

Because the health care system is built with those estimates in mind. It's the same with electricity infrastructure on climatologically hot days. The infrastructure is only built to handle a certain normal peak load. COVID-19 like a heat wave, is abnormal.