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ECMO uses immense amount of resources, both in scarce equipment and trained staff to monitor and manage.

Great to say “this one case we won’t let die”. Useless in “we have 50k people who need this” scenarios.

If you need ECMO for any reason you are seriously, deathly, ill: it is a last resort with long odds. It has many complications, is expensive, and there are ethical questions to ask.

Eg, http://www.bioethics.net/2019/05/is-it-time-for-the-dne-do-n...

Though I agree with you, I think this patient was receiving mechanical ventilation as well as ECMO. I don't know if they were simultaneous

Edit: Another plus for ECMO is that ventilation procedure creates a serious infection risk for doctors and nurses, but ECMO doesn't. Losing a doctor costs a lot more than $100K

There were reports from Italy early on that ECMO machines were important.