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The fact that hospitals are a business isn't much of a revelation. So you want to build more hospitals and add more ICU's beds strictly because people refuse to get the vaccine, sure it's cheaper to build a hospital than to get a free vaccine shot.
Vaccines prevent people from ending up in ICU beds, my link supports that point.
Yes, just like they did for the obese in the first wave. They expand space to take care of sick people.
There are 6,090 hospitals in the US. According to the AHA ( 2019) 80% has ICUs.
ICUs tend to be specialized, surgical, cardiac, neonatal, pediatric, stroke, burn care, general care.
Hospitals are primarily regulated at the county/ state level. The state determines the number and type of ICU beds.
An excess of beds and the associated pricey infrastructure and staffing to support those beds would either sit vacant or entice hospitals to redirect non- critical patients to the ICU.
Patients hospitalized with Covid, are isolated from non -Covid patients, regardless of level of care. Regions pay close attention to infection rates to determine the number of beds they will need to convert to isolated units.
When this happens it reduces capacity for non- Covid patients. This is why elective surgeries were cancelled in most areas for periods of time during the worst of Covid, last year.
North Dakota had the highest rate of hospitalizations and fatalities in the world for a spell during early 4th quarter, last year. Medical professionals from the Air Force were necessary to supplement.
No shortage of hospital systems cross state lines and staffing from surrounding states were sometimes drafted to hospitals in adjacent states, until home states were inundated. In some cases, it became necessary to transport/ airlift Covid patients from hospitals at capacity to hospitals with capacity within a state. Getting a recovered patient home was a huge variable with plenty of anecdotal stories.
No shortage of large scale outdoor music events happening across the country, right now or next week. Some seem to be taking some semblance of precautions, like lolapalooza in Chicago that will likely receive 100,000 a day over 4 days. I say semblance because the gates are not closely checking documentation of negative Covid tests as tens of thousands surge in.
Others, like the annual Sturgis Motorcycle event, in South Dakota expect 750,000 and are letting it rip. It is believed the 2020 event was the super spreader trigger for the surge of Covid in the upper Midwest, last year.
It takes time for Covid to spread through a local population. There have been no lockdowns in the US. No one who tested positive was forced to self quarantine/ isolate unless sick enough to require hospitalization.
Anyway, the # of ICU beds dedicated to Covid patients is a state issue.
Arkansas has the third lowest fully vaccinated rate for those 18 and older in the US, at 36.3%. Who knows how few age 12-17 have been vaccinated. It has reason to be concerned.
Only saving grace is that most who are hospitalized with Covid do not end up in the ICI. They do however, require isolation from the general population which reduces capacity for non Covid people.
So glad to see that you agree that hospitals are more about running a business first. And yes, there is such a thing as normal capacity since as you agreed, this is a business.
The government has done little if anything to increase capacity. And it's been 1 1/2 years now so no one can tell me they couldn't have built more hospitals. Billions of dollars have been given out in different forms of aid. And as a country, we don't have the money to build more knowing full well a 2nd wave was predicted by this fall. Absolutely absurd and it shows the focus is not on providing care. China has built many and I read a story that they had one completed in 6 days!
Your link does nothing to strengthen your argument. In fact, it detracts from it.
Hospitals like to run at 75% ... that's one of the facts that the Chicken Littles fail to comprehend - the other is that hospitals being on bypass (where they don't accept incoming patients) is not something out of the ordinary. It happened with regularity pre-pandemic.
Let's look at Ingalls Memorial in Harvey, Illinois - a Chicago suburb.
It's located smack in the middle of of a demographic (non-white, lower socioeconomic) that has a higher risk for not only contracting but being hospitalized and dying of covid - or so the CDC says.
And yet, the hospital was never overrun.
As for the government not doing anything to increase capacity - they did at the beginning of the pandemic. They built field hospitals like McCormick Place in Chicago and sent the USS Comfort to NYC.
Both of which - as well as the rest of them - remained basically unused.
They were filling up with obese people before the vaccines, and yet we didn't have a campaign blaming the obese for filling up the hospitals. We built tent hospitals, got a hospital ship in NY, and converted the Javits center for them. Because it is morally repugnant to not care for sick people, regardless of why they are sick. Now somehow it's okay to blame sick people for taking up hospital space.
Meanwhile, in my county they have fully disassembled the tent hospitals that cost 15 million to build. I hope they don't complain about not having enough beds if we get another surge. Or about having a shortage of health care workers, when they fire those who don't want the shots.
Good points.
The science is clear, being obese is unhealthy in many ways including with Covid. We shouldn't fat shame people, but we also shouldn't BS around pretending that you can be obese and healthy.
Obesity is likely a bigger threat than the unvaccinated at least in terms of an individual.
Meanwhile as you point out we squandered resources and packed covid patients into retirement homes which has vulnerable people.
Hospitals like to run at 75% ... that's one of the facts that the Chicken Littles fail to comprehend - the other is that hospitals being on bypass (where they don't accept incoming patients) is not something out of the ordinary. It happened with regularity pre-pandemic.
Let's look at Ingalls Memorial in Harvey, Illinois - a Chicago suburb.
It's located smack in the middle of of a demographic (non-white, lower socioeconomic) that has a higher risk for not only contracting but being hospitalized and dying of covid - or so the CDC says.
And yet, the hospital was never overrun.
As for the government not doing anything to increase capacity - they did at the beginning of the pandemic. They built field hospitals like McCormick Place in Chicago and sent the USS Comfort to NYC.
Both of which - as well as the rest of them - remained basically unused.
I used to work that ER back in the late '70's. As I recall the local demographics also included richer/Jewish. Which helped make for a most interesting medical day!
I used to work that ER back in the late '70's. As I recall the local demographics also included richer/Jewish. Which helped make for a most interesting medical day!
Explain this please. Interesting in exactly what ways?
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