Friday night reflection. I see a lot of people quoting a 1% overall mortality rate for COVID-19 and comparing it to influenza, as if to minimize the impact of what is coming (as if any excess death is somehow ok). This is not just about people who die of the virus. /1
It is about the overall harm it causes to the one in five people who become seriously ill. The seriously ill people will still end up in the hospital for up to a month, and end up with lung damage and other serious sequelae they have to deal with for the rest of their lives. /2
This huge wave of people being sick and hospitalized will totally overwhelm the health system so that we cannot care for other major medical problems people might have. /3
That means we won't be able to treat people with cancer, heart attacks, diabetes, etc, because there will be no leftover capacity. /4
Here in the earliest days of this rising wave, we are already finding ourselves overwhelmed. And that is with just a few tens of extra cases. /5
Heck, an average Friday night overwhelms most hospitals in the US. Hospitals are a huge mess busy on a given day. Anybody who has ever been to the ER knows you may wait hours and hours to be seen. /6
That is baseline. If people don’t understand this, they just have no idea whatsoever how hospitals in the US operate. Hospitals simply are not built to have unused capacity. They are built to be full at baseline. /7
When this wave hits, there will simply be no ability to care for any other illness people may have. That means we won't be able to treat people with cancer, heart attacks, diabetes, etc, because there will be no leftover capacity. /8
Stay at home. Wash your hands. Go for walks in the park away from people. Support local small businesses through takeout if you can. We are all in this together. Flatten the curve. /9
