Simply put, there aren't enough hospital beds, there aren't enough ventilators and there won't be enough staff to care for patients if this virus gets out of control. We NEED to control the spread. We currently have around 100,000 ventilators in service in the USA. Of those ventilators, about 80% are in use. We do have a number of ventilators in emergency surplus. But if we don't control the spread, it won't be enough.
'We’ll take them all': Demand for ventilators spikes as coronavirus looms
On Friday, the Society of Critical Care Medicine released a new report highlighting the scarcity of available medical resources in the U.S., including ventilators. The report cited the latest available data, including from a 2009 survey of hospitals, indicating that hospitals could use both existing machines and pull older devices from storage, as well as the 8,900 sitting in emergency stockpiles. Combined, the organization estimated hospitals could get their hands on roughly 200,000 devices, but that the number of available medical staff able to operate them at any one time would lower that number significantly. With some worse-case estimates showing more than 900,000 people could need ventilators, according to the American Hospital Association, the report raises concerns about a shortfall in both machines and the people to operate them.
