Yeah, I am starting to get annoyed at the obsession with having enough ventilators, describing them as "life saving equipment", leaving the impression that most can be saved if you can just put them on a ventilator. Yet stats out of NYC are 80% don't survive to come off the ventilator. And you have to wonder if the 20% who do, did the vent actually save them, or they would have survived even with less aggressive treatment.
The news coverage leaves you thinking most of the ICU patients will be saved if there's enough ventilators. When in reality doctors and nurses are risking their own lives to treat ICU wards full of intubated, sedated patients most of whom will die because they don't have an effective treatment. Not a pretty story, probably why nobody wants to talk about it. There are trials of various treatments going on, it would be great if some of them turned out to work. Not necessarily a cure or a vaccine, but a therapy so less people die. -----Original Message----- From: AF <af-boun...@af.afmug.com> On Behalf Of Bill Prince Sent: Saturday, April 11, 2020 1:57 PM To: AFMUG <af@af.afmug.com> Subject: [AFMUG] OT: More on COVID Saw this in our local paper this morning. It's interesting to me because it's bringing to light the fact that COVID-19 is apparently not what people are dying from, it's the secondary ARDS-like (Accute Respiratory Distress Syndrome) condition. There is also some debate within the medical community whether ventilators are helping or hurting. Maybe what they need to do is just supply oxygen. If this link doesn't work for you, I can email the article. https://www.mercurynews.com/2020/04/11/when-coronavirus-kills-its-like-death-by-drowning-and-doctors-disagree-on-best-treatment/ -- bp <part15sbs{at}gmail{dot}com> -- AF mailing list AF@af.afmug.com http://af.afmug.com/mailman/listinfo/af_af.afmug.com -- AF mailing list AF@af.afmug.com http://af.afmug.com/mailman/listinfo/af_af.afmug.com
