As the coronavirus spread, healthcare facilities are concerned about potential shortages of supplies and beds, according to an article on the Time website.
“We are not ready. We are not ready virtually anywhere in the country for that kind of onslaught on our health care system,” said Irwin Redlener, director of the National Center for Disaster Preparedness at Columbia University.
There are approximately 95,000 intensive care beds in the country, but “even in the moderate attack rate of the coronavirus,” he believes there could be a need for more than double that number,” he said in the article.
Redlener also said he believes the U.S. has only a “fraction” of the mechanical ventilators that could be needed. A 2010 survey estimated that there were likely around 62,000 mechanical ventilators in U.S. hospitals.
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