My question in this post is How do ventilators work, and why do we need them now in the age of COVID-19? Governor Andrew Cuomo of NY has asked for 30,000 ventilators. Trump questions that he’ll need that many. Instead of mobilizing the country to provide the support that states and localities need, Trump has stood in the way of American’s health and safety. The result of this is more infection, more patients for hospitals, and the need for ventilators to help COVID-19 victims breathe.
COVID-19 is a disease that inflicts damage to the lungs. COVID-19 is a disease which can lead to pneumonia. The cause is a new virus—severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2, or Sars-CoV-2. The illness caused by this virus is Covid-19.
According to the World Health Organization (WHO), one in six persons who are infected with the new virus will become seriously sick, and will develop difficulty breathing. In an article in the Guardian, Graham Readfearn reports on the effect of COVID-19. He interviewed Professor John Wilson, president-elect of the Royal Australasian College of Physicians and a respiratory physician. In the quote that follows, Professor Wilson explains what happens to people with a severe illness caused by the new virus.
When people with Covid-19 develop a cough and fever, Wilson (Professor John Wilson, president-elect of the Royal Australasian College of Physicians and a respiratory physician) says this is a result of the infection reaching the respiratory tree – the air passages that conduct air between the lungs and the outside. He says: The lining of the respiratory tree becomes injured, causing inflammation. This in turn irritates the nerves in the lining of the airway. Just a speck of dust can stimulate a cough. “But if this gets worse, it goes past just the lining of the airway and goes to the gas exchange units, which are at the end of the air passages. “If they become infected they respond by pouring out inflammatory material into the air sacs that are at the bottom of our lungs.” If the air sacs then become inflamed, Wilson says this causes an “outpouring of inflammatory material [fluid and inflammatory cells] into the lungs and we end up with pneumonia.” He says lungs that become filled with inflammatory material are unable to get enough oxygen to the bloodstream, reducing the body’s ability to take on oxygen and get rid of carbon dioxide. “That’s the usual cause of death with severe pneumonia,” he says.
Graham Readfearn, What happens to people’s lungs when they get coronavirus? The Guardian, March 28, 2020
How do Ventilators Work?
This is a 15 minute video that explains very simply how mechanical ventilators work. At the present time, there is huge shortage of these ventilators in the United States and in other countries of the world. Without ventilators, people who have a severe case of COVID-19 will not be able to breathe without them.
Why We Need Ventilators Now?
According to a New Times article, ventilators, which deliver air to the lungs through a tube placed in the windpipe, are a crucial tool to keep Covid-19 patients alive. The computerized, bedside machines can cost as much as $50,000. There are about 160,000 ventilators in the United States, and 12,700 ventilators in the National Strategic Stockpile. Even if the ventilators were evenly distributed in the U.S., there would be only 3,200 per state. As I mentioned at the top of this post, Governor Cuomo said he needs 30,000 of them. The Times article also reports that not only are the machines complicated, but many are made by foreign-based companies. And reported in the same article, a company in St. Louis, which makes about 1,000 ventilators per year, indicated it would take nearly 8 months to crank up their factory to increase production.
We need more ventilators now because the number of serious Covid-19 cases increasing at the rate that is overwhelming hospitals. Although attention has been placed on New York (where it should be), there many hospitals in smaller communities that will come up short, and will have no source of additional ventilators.
At the heart of this problem is the Trump administration lame and utterly horrific response to the Covid-19 pandemic—an epidemic of global proportions. Europe is under siege, joining the United States as the hot spots fighting against this new virus. Trump is a dangerous man in this situation. He has questioned whether Governor Cuomo’s request for 30,000 ventilators is warranted without offering any data to support his view.
Discussion has been going on the White House to work with General Motors and Vantec Life Systems to produce thousands of ventilators at a cost of $1 billion. According to this article in Ars Technica, the deal apparently is going forward. But as Jon Brodkin said in his article,
The Trump administration has, as we wrote yesterday, sent conflicting signals about the seriousness the pandemic and taken too long to implement a coherent plan for fighting the coronavirus.
Jon Brodkin, Trump orders GM to make ventilators, claims company is “wasting time”, Ars Technica, 3/27/2020.
We need to support the medical community by insisting that the government provide the tools to support the sick that will be coming to hospitals in increasing number of the next month or longer.
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