| My understanding that a number of things contribute to this difficulty: - What are the number of critical care beds in the hospital? - What are the number of negative pressure rooms in the critical care unit? Negative pressure rooms help keep a contagion contained. - Critical care rooms typically have a ventilator, but they require a critical care physician to determine the correct parameters for the vent and a respiratory therapist (RT) to set and monitor the vent - Does the critical care physician have the appropriate personal protective clothing (PPC)? I believe the norm is some kind of suit along with an N95 mask. I'm not sure if this disease has something extra required. Mostly, I mention this because the equation of what is necessary is complex and breakdowns in this can cause problems. For example, if there's not enough PPC, then the RT and physician can become ill, which means they can't treat patients. At least in the U.S., critical care is a fellowship on top of a residency, so you can't exactly replace them quickly. If there are not enough negative pressure rooms, then the disease can spread more easily in the hospital. Now, that said, I don't know enough about Italy and their system to fully explain what happened there. I do know that it's not as simple as number of hospital beds, which is why I replied in the first place. This makes a direct comparison to the U.S. at best difficult. Anyway, there's a lot of dramatically incorrect information being thrown around. There's a lot of people claiming to be physicians and saying some really hyperbolic things. I'm not happy about that, so my small contribution is to at least provide a better reference for something concrete, which is number of ICU beds in the U.S. and elsewhere within the last decade. |