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Comment by 101404 | Hacker News Reader

We were mostly lucky to have about four times as many ventilators as France or Italy.

The numbers I read in two different sources: Germany has about 20,000 ventilator places, while France, Italy, Spain, and UK have about 5,000 each.

So in Germany, we didn't hit the "no more ventilators" situation and people didn't die.

Edit: Here a recent article confirming it: "Germany still has 10,000 free ICU beds" (in German: https://www.tagesspiegel.de/politik/coronavirus-in-deutschla...)

Edit 2: Pretty sick, considering that in Italy and France thousands are dying because there are no ICU beds, and here in Germany they are just empty and unused.

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It's a funny kind of luck that requires planning and investment over many years.

Not really. Its just a number in the books. Whoever made that decision decades ago, got it right, luckily. But that's about it.

Had this virus affected the kidneys instead of the lungs, the outcome would have been way different.

Also, over the last week, mortality has been increasing here as well. So better "den Tag nicht vor dem Abend loben".

> Had this virus affected the kidneys instead of the lungs, the outcome would have been way different.

And if my aunt had wheels and pedals, she'd be a bicycle.

They didn't stock up on ventilators by throwing darts at a dartboard to choose what type of medical equipment to buy. They stocked up on ventilators because a pandemic centering on a respiratory illness was statistically much more likely to occur than one centering on the kidneys.

> And if my aunt had wheels and pedals, she'd be a bicycle.

But that would not make your aunt a deadly virus, would it?

> statistically much more likely

Maybe. Just like the US did. Or maybe it was some other reason. I believe you don't have any source?

> Had this virus affected the kidneys instead of the lungs, the outcome would have been way different.

Kidney infections don't tend to spread easily.

In the this week in virology podcast from Friday they talk with a clinician in NYC who mentions they are trying to avoid respirators and use masks and nose oxygen. He mentioned the illness looks more like altitude sickness and respiratory distress and that ventilators could be doing more damage than good at that stage.

Dr. Seheult touched on this as well in his update a few days ago. Really worth watching as well:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o8aG63yigjA

Luck favors the prepared mind, so could it be just an indicator of something deeper?

Maybe Germany has 4x as much ventilators as France, but also k times as much of many other things that matter?

I wonder if countries like France will realize they have to improve and become more like Germany instead of doubling down on their downwards spiral.

> Luck favors the prepared mind,

Then the US should be much better off, because they have about ten times more ventilators than Germany has. But only four times the population.

But, the US was unlucky to have 50% of cases in only one city. So they ran out of ventilators in that one place, while having a surplus elsewhere.

They reacted quickly and correctly by sending hospital ships (much quicker than trying to put ICU beds on trucks).

Of course, compared to the EU, the US is still handling the situation way better.

Unfortunately the hospital ships are equipped to deal with wartime problems, i.e. trauma victims. They don't help too much in a pandemic.

They are not there to treat COVID-19, but to lower the "day to day load" of hospitals, so the hospitals have more capacity for COVID-19 patients. At least that's what they said on PBS Newshour.

That changed about a week ago.

https://newyork.cbslocal.com/2020/04/06/coronavirus-update-u...

I'm not sure about Germany, but at least in Italy ICUs were at 80% capacity when the outbreak hit.

Doubt it, people in need of ventilators would clearly fall under Covid19 mortality, not all cause mortality. Also it seems that people who are put on ventilators are pretty much goners anyway.

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