The morning news on April 2 has these COVID-19 statistics for the world: 946,000 confirmed cases and 45,000 deaths. The most deaths have been in Italy at 13,155 and Spain at 10,003.[1]
The U.S. Situation[2]
The U.S. now has the most cases in the world with 214,461 and the third-most deaths at 4,841. In addition, the federal government is projecting U.S. total deaths (best case) to be 100,000 to 240,000
Adding to the gravity of the situation in the U.S., the federal government’s “emergency stockpile of respirator masks, gloves and other medical supplies is running low and is nearly exhausted due to the coronavirus outbreak, leaving the Trump administration and the states to compete for personal protective equipment in a freewheeling global marketplace rife with profiteering and price-gouging, according to Department of Homeland Security officials involved in the frantic acquisition effort.”
According to an anonymous DHS official, ““The stockpile was designed to respond to a handful of cities. It was never built or designed to fight a 50-state pandemic. This is not only a U.S. government problem. The supply chain for PPE worldwide has broken down, and there is a lot of price-gouging happening.”
Moreover, thousands more of the ventilators in the federal stockpile do not work and are unavailable “after the contract to maintain . . . [them] lapsed late last summer, and a contracting dispute meant that a new firm did not begin its work until late January.”
State of Minnesota Situation [3]
My State of Minnesota has 689 cases and 17 deaths as it struggles to acquire needed supplies and equipment. The peak of our cases is now expected between early May and early June followed by the highest need for hospital beds.
“Several hospitals are adding more beds on their campuses. ‘The limiting factor is the availability of ventilators to be able to equip those rooms,’ Jan Malcolm, the State Health Commissioner, said. Operating rooms could also be converted to intensive care because many of them have ventilators. The state is also scouting locations for temporary hospitals, using buildings, such as closed nursing homes, that could house patients who don’t need critical care and are not infected with the coronavirus. The goal is to add 2,750 temporary beds, with 1,000 of them in the metro area.
According to Lee Schafer, a business columnist for the StarTribune, Minnesota’s hospital system is designed to handle “a normal patient load” because “unused capacity costs money” and because “health care in this state was efficient.”
Conclusion
All of the these developments makes a Minnesota senior citizen currently in overall good health like this blogger realize that if he contracts the COVID-19 virus during the next 60 days or so, he will enter the hospital system at its most stressful period. Therefore, it is even more important now to maintain six feet of separation from other people, to avoid groups of 10 or more people, to cover your mouth when you cough, to wash your hands frequently and to maintain physical fitness. Finally make sure your wills, trust agreements and health care directives are up to date. And study the Protective Orders for Life Sustaining Treatment (POLST) and determine your choices on that form.[4]
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[1] Coronavirus Map: Tracking the global Outbreak, N.Y. Times (April 2, 2020).
[2] N. 1 supra; Miroff, Protective gear in national stockpile is nearly depleted, DHS officials say, Wash. Post (April 1, 2020); Miroff, Gloves, masks and ventilators near gone, StarTribune (April 2, 2020) (print edition); Madhani, Freking & Alonso-Zaldivar, Trump says ‘life and death’ at stake in following guidelines, StarTribune (April 1, 2020).
[3] Tracking coronavirus in Minnesota, StarTribune (April 1, 2020); Howatt, Minnesota COVID-19 cases increase by 60 to 689 with 5 more deaths, StarTribune (April 2, 2020); Schafer. Here’s why Minnesota doesn’t have enough hospital beds right now, StarTribune (April 2, 2020).
[4] See these posts to dwkcommentarie.com: Pandemic Journal (# 5): POLST (Provider Orders for Life-Sustaining Treatment) (Mar. 29, 2020); Pandemic Journal (# 6): Maintaining Physical Fitness (April 1, 2020). Here are the earlier posts in this ongoing series: Pandemic Journal (# 1): Kristof and Osterholm Analyses (Mar. 23, 2020); Pandemic Journal (# 2): Westminster Presbyterian Church Service (03/22/20) (Mar. 24, 2020); Pandemic Journal (# 3): 1918 Flu (Mar. 27, 2020); Pandemic Journal (# 4): “Life” Poem (Mar. 28, 2020);