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Comment by yiyus | Hacker News Reader

This is a great initiative, but it looks to me like most of these projects are directed to help the US. That's totally understandable, but there are many people all over the world willing to help with this, and it would be great if we could also collaborate to help everyone.

For example, as an engineer, I was interested in helping with the 1M ventilators project, but reading the description it looks like the goal is to create a reserve for the US of more than 740000 ventilators. Sorry, but I want to help people everywhere, not just in the US. The whole world needs ventilators.

Maybe I just misunderstood, and the US numbers were just indicative, but it does not look like a global effort. Does anybody knows of a similar initiative that is not so focused on the US?

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> Sorry, but I want to help people everywhere, not just in the US. The whole world needs ventilators.

The US is part of the world. This is like people who think that global oil prices are irrelevant if the US produces more than it consumes.

They're talking about building ventilators. That causes more of them to exist in the world. Then when the US needs them, they use those instead of outbidding other countries for existing stock, causing more to be available for the rest of the world too.

I'm European (I'm sorry I did not say that in my previous comment, because it can be misunderstood without that data). Europe is being hit harder now and we're part of the world too, why then not focusing on building ventilators for Europe so the US and other parts of the world will have more? Logically, you will prefer to work helping your own country, or even your own local community. That's normal and, in my opinion, the right thing to do.

However, since this is a global problem, I think there may be initiatives with which an engineer can help that are not focused in a particular region. I'm interested in those and, in particular, those that could directly help here.

I already got some good suggestions, so thank you for all the responses!

I think you still didn't get the point? He's just saying he wants to help with a global project not the ones focused only on US

Then make a global website? Or post a project on this site that is global in nature?

While I agree with the logic you present, you don't really disprove the US-first mentality OP is mentioning. Which is pretty fucked up approach for anybody outside of US (like it or not, its 95% of the mankind). Where would this finish? Should we treat only US persons (a number which is rising exponentially just like anywhere else), and only after this is fully covered should we care about the rest?

You might have not intended to make it look that way, but after what Trump pulled (yet again) with trying to bribe German company to produce vaccine ONLY for Americans (German government confirms that, so I have 0 doubt its true), he pissed most of the world pretty badly with this selfish approach.

I get it, he has absolutely 0 morals and would sell his mother for profit, but this is lower than low.

This is a global problem, and we need to treat it as such. US specific ones will simply get little support from elsewhere. Just like nobody would expect too much US participation in solving mainly Lithuania issues.

> you don't really disprove the US-first mentality OP is mentioning.

Not the grandparent, but I don't think that was the point. We're out of time to finesse ideal planning. We need hardware. Now. Ventilators are hardware. A device in the US means the US doesn't need to source it from somewhere else, and at the end of the day it's likely to save a few lives somewhere, and that matters.

I mean, sure, maybe your compatriot volunteers are jingoist nutjobs who refuse to make ventilators for anyone but americans. It's time to put that aside and just get stuff done.

Also, note the collision of framing: if someone encouraged you to check on your neighbors and shop for them if needed, you wouldn't refuse to do that because other neighborhoods might need the help more, right?

But there is a choice, and as a Canadian why on earth would you expect me to work for your reserve supply instead of mine? The US needs a reality check.

I don't know how to answer that. I can tell you that as an American, I might not necessarily want to help with a "Ventilators for Canadians" project (vs. other stuff I could be doing), but I certainly wouldn't argue it shouldn't exist.

Get stuff done folks. The time for parochialism has passed, and the time for recriminations and justice must be in the future.

> but I certainly wouldn't argue it shouldn't exist.

Nobody has argued that.

> if someone encouraged you to check on your neighbors and shop for them if needed, you wouldn't refuse to do that because other neighborhoods might need the help more, right?

It's more like someone asking me to help their neighbours rather than help my own neighbours. Why should I prefer to help your neighbours than mine?

Anyone can create a project on this website. If you want to help your own neighbors and don't feel these help, post a project.

"For example, as an engineer, I was interested in helping with the 1M ventilators project, but reading the description it looks like the goal is to create a reserve for the US of more than 740000 ventilators. Sorry, but I want to help people everywhere, not just in the US. The whole world needs ventilators."

Just because the description appears that way doesn't mean you could not join the team/project and bring a broader more global perspective that may not have been considered. On top of engineering, a bigger vision (backed with appropriate strategy) can be value-add to an initiative, why not simply pitch/propose it?

So, the 1M ventilator project is going to be open-source, and have two stages: A crowdsourced, local 3d printing stage for getting devices into the hands of hospitals as soon as is possible, and a mass-produced stage with a large supply chain.

The first one is global... all you would need is the files and a 3d printer. The second one is going to need a lot of work for getting it into every country that needs it.

You can contribute to both, and recruit anyone you can to work on the supply chain issues for getting it into spain.

I am french and currently stuck in lockdown. I've had similar feelings with these projects being mainly directed to the US (not that it is a bad thing at all, more that I don't find it directly relevant).

As much as I would also love to help the whole world, I have a feeling that I will personally be more efficient working on small projects trying to solve relevant local issues.

I am not sure where to start, but if anyone is in the same situation and/or have some ideas, let's get in touch and try to do something.

Maybe people from other places (particularly Europe) should join the projects and start sister sub-projects to do the same things but for Europe.

For the 1M ventilator one, for instance, there's no reason everyone can't work together on the design phase, because that's universal and open-source.

Once that's done, there can be separate teams by nation or region to do the parts that are more specific to those places, such as financing, manufacturing, and distribution. These teams could still all be part of the larger project so they could learn from each other, while still focusing on their own immediate areas of responsibility.

You may want to check https://github.com/opencovid19-fr/comment-contribuer :-)

I think a pan european one would be nice? Is there one?

I think you are right, but it likely reflects the node we sit on in the internet.

If this were not hacker news, but some german equivalent in the german language, I am sure you would find a german focused effort.

I think it makes sense that most of the efforts would be local (someone has to distribute and man the ventilator). The global effort should be focused on design, and best practices.

FWIW, the German federal government (of all people), is organizing a distributed hackathon this upcoming weekend: https://wirvsvirushackathon.org/

Seems like it's supposed to be (mostly) in German language as well. If they do and market this right this might actually be an opportunity to get non-tech people to contribute important PROBLEMS that can be solved by tech right now, so we don't just get another few dozen news aggregators and case tracker dashboards.

Just to clarify because it is not obvious from the homepage: This is not actually organized by the government, but by a private non-profit startup funded by the federal government. That makes some difference and now I've given my email address to a random Berlin startup.

Good to know, I missed that. Luckily I've given them AN email :)

I moved to Germany and learnt German and looked around for the German developer internet: it just doesn't exist.

You can list German projects in English, most of the Germans understand it really well, including most developers in Europe.

Yes! I think it is normal than everyone cares about their own country, and of course in HN people are more worried about the US and the SF area in particular. But I'm also sure there will be other initiatives that could benefit more people and as someone from Europe (we're minority here, but still quite a few!), that's what I'd like to help with.

I think many people -- Americans or otherwise -- are global in their mindset. Its just hard to translate your language and your network and friends and learnings into something that might be relevant everywhere.

Yeah I think you're correct, its quite indicative of America in general currently.

Do I missunderstand something or isn't it necessary for the real bad cases to intubate the person needing the ventilator? I think the bottleneck here is a lot more complicated than "moaaar" ventilators. Also if you have 1 Mio. people on ventilation, these probably are not able to move on theirselves, so you need a care person to turn them every hour. Additionally hooking them up to a ventilator and pressing "play" seems to be a recipe for trouble, be it from mechanical damage because of faulty settings or bacterial infections not being treated at all until it's too late...

So think of care in this case being a pipeline, and right now the bottleneck is ventilators. Once we solve that, we may well have other bottlenecks, but right now this is the main one.

Well designed modern ventilators once set require minimal attention, and the overall settings for most COVID cases seem to be well understood from what the literature has suggested.

In terms of bacterial infections, it depends on the type of ventilation used and there are some variables here, but regular ventilator sanitation procedures should be fine, and currently have proven to be fine.

are you a doctor or why are you so sure? In italy they don't have space, ventilators or personel. As this is not a time-independent pipeline-problem with human lifes at stake, I don't think that it's really effective to say: just let's do one part after the other without even knowing that someone is taking care of the rest)

A care person is a very low skill job, it's not a critical bottleneck. (In many cases family could make do, especially if you have some cooperation. One person can't do it but two could trade off doing two people.)

...

You might find this project more appealing: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22573743

Thanks! Still learning about it, but I think I'll join.

Crowd-sourcing a producable design should help everyone. There are some assumptions (that I believe to be correct) that longer supply chains will be somewhat unreliable, so arranging local production is probably better for the patients anyway. I think there's inspiration in the Italians who were printing ventilator valves en masse.

I agree, a global solution is ideal. But please keep in mind these initiatives, if they speed up treatment or help stockpile resources, will allow others to use those cures and/or the other supplies that would be freed up.

Also, it may be more effective to concentrate everyone in one project that starts with the US since it has the most resources (technology, medical, science, etc) and then send out the results rather than having sparse groups trying to do the same thing for all different areas of the globe.

Best to build a prototype for a focused set of problems and users, then expand out once you have success there. Difference between needing 750k ventilators and 200m ventilators and also simultaneously having to solve all the global regulations, shipping, distribution, customs, etc.

This is a silly comment. The site existing is better than nothing, it's a step in the right direction.

And, projects can be added for any location. Stop complaining and take action.

I did not complain. I actually said it is a great initiative, and I even said that maybe I misunderstood.

Of course this site is better than nothing. I think it is great! Nobody is discussing that.

Taking action is exactly what I'm trying to do, but my own country (Spain) is being hit very hard with this, so I think it is understandable that I prefer to focus in some project that can also benefit us.

I think your original comment would have been a lot clearer and less controversial if you had mentioned you live in Spain. :)

It absolutely makes sense that you would want to work on a project directed closer to your home.

Yes, I am sorry about that.

It is too late to edit it now, but I already admitted in another comment that leaving out that information was a mistake.

Nevertheless, I think that my comment brought up some unexpected interesting discussions.

No need to apologize! Perhaps the rest of us should not have read it assuming you were in the U.S.

These projects were posted by the community. Volunteer yourself or create a new one.

I will suggest that anyone here who knows of something based elsewhere or with an international perspective can and should post it.

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