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Hospital layoffs aren't necessarily because they have overcapacity. Elective procedures were canceled, and all non-covid departments were basically shut down in

Hospital layoffs aren't necessarily because they have overcapacity. Elective procedures were canceled, and all non-covid departments were basically shut down in NYC at the peak. In NY, the plan is to start reopening on May 15, with frequent testing, with the metric being the replication rate (trying to keep R0 below 1.1). There are plans. The US did not approach this crisis in a centralized way which we probably should have, so opening up is going to be a collection of 50 plans as well, but that's not no plan.

jerf 7y ago
"Hospital layoffs aren't necessarily because they have overcapacity. Elective procedures were canceled, and all non-covid departments were basically shut down in NYC at the peak." There is this peculiar internet pattern I've seen many times now, where people seem to believe if they can explain why X happened, they can therefore prove X didn't happen. It is one of those things I just can't wrap my head around. You say in one sentence that hospitals don't have overcapacity right now, then explain exactly why they do. That's overcapacity. They shut down everything to make capacity for the incoming crush of Covid cases, and those have almost entirely not materialized. So we are grossly overcapacity for Covid cases, in the vast majority of the country. "In NY" New York is the outlier. It is not what the entire country should be basing its plans on. It isn't even what the entire State of New York should be basing its plans on. "so opening up is going to be a collection of 50 plans as well, but that's not no plan." I didn't say there was no plan. I'm observing that the stated plan is deviating from the actions. Almost everywhere, we have nominally hit the benchmarks that were the initial trigger for re-opening things, but for the most part, anyone reopening things is doing it against massive political pressure and criticism, while people, yea verily even people in power like governors, are pushing for it to continue for more weeks or months with no end criterion given. I'll reiterate that one possibility is just lag, but if in another month there's still a lot of lockdowns going on in non-outlier areas, that's clearly not going to be what's going on. (I know there's a lot of grumbling online, but my personal position is, my job is nearly unaffected, our schools are already closed for the rest of the year regardless and I'm planning on staying home no matter what the state does, and I live close enough to one of the outlier areas that I would be perfectly fine with me personally still being in significant lockdown in another month. But what's good for me isn't what's good for everybody in the country.)

jerf 7y ago

"Hospital layoffs aren't necessarily because they have overcapacity. Elective procedures were canceled, and all non-covid departments were basically shut down in NYC at the peak." There is this peculiar internet pattern I've seen many times now, where people seem to believe if they can explain why X happened, they can therefore prove X didn't happen. It is one of those things I just can't wrap my head around. You say in one sentence that hospitals don't have overcapacity right now, then explain exactly why they do. That's overcapacity. They shut down everything to make capacity for the incoming crush of Covid cases, and those have almost entirely not materialized. So we are grossly overcapacity for Covid cases, in the vast majority of the country. "In NY" New York is the outlier. It is not what the entire country should be basing its plans on. It isn't even what the entire State of New York should be basing its plans on. "so opening up is going to be a collection of 50 plans as well, but that's not no plan." I didn't say there was no plan. I'm observing that the stated plan is deviating from the actions. Almost everywhere, we have nominally hit the benchmarks that were the initial trigger for re-opening things, but for the most part, anyone reopening things is doing it against massive political pressure and criticism, while people, yea verily even people in power like governors, are pushing for it to continue for more weeks or months with no end criterion given. I'll reiterate that one possibility is just lag, but if in another month there's still a lot of lockdowns going on in non-outlier areas, that's clearly not going to be what's going on. (I know there's a lot of grumbling online, but my personal position is, my job is nearly unaffected, our schools are already closed for the rest of the year regardless and I'm planning on staying home no matter what the state does, and I live close enough to one of the outlier areas that I would be perfectly fine with me personally still being in significant lockdown in another month. But what's good for me isn't what's good for everybody in the country.)