I really don’t feel like starting an argument with anyone about being proactive based on desperate situations already unfolding (Italy) but I do want to think that some people understand the potential value of being proactive, especially given what we can learn from watching the news from Italy these days (Sweden is probably next, BTW).
I also want point out that I do rely on and I do appreciate domain experts (including medical experts) just as much as anybody else. Especially under normal circumstances.
But “normal circumstances” is not what we see everywhere right now.
And experts is not always the only thing needed (depending on circumstances). Let’s start with the term “experts”. I’m an expert in breathing. I’m an expert also in knowing how important it is to be able to breath (you learn quickly if loosing your breath). I simply assume you are all experts in this field.
I also have a son who was only minutes, or seconds, away from dying due to an allergic chock resulting in his pulmonary alveolus going nonfunctional. By coincidence, or by providence, who knows which?, he was at work only a few hundred meters away from the emergency entrance of Uppsala University Hospital, Sweden when he collapsed, alone in a park outside his workplace on his way home at the other side of the park (His wife saw him collapse from their kitchen window). Doctors thought he was already gone, but the ICU team still kept on going for 45 minutes, and tides turned. Unbelievable.
Anyway, some individuals are “more experts” than others in understanding a PROBLEM, like for example hundreds of Italians not being provided such medical care (as my son) and so they are left to die. This is happening as we speak. As long as they are still conscious they understand the problem, which is my main point here. Understanding a problem. Or one of the problems.
And one of the problems is the lack of resources when the number of infected individuals explode. When, not if.
And they really do have medical experts in Italy. But we know that lack of medical experts isn’t the problem and not even a lack of awareness of a terrible problem is the biggest problem. The biggest problem is lack of solutions in the places where they are overwhelmed lacking capacity.
This problem can be solved. But only in advance, before the situation goes out of hand.
In SOME cases (but luckily not in all cases) experts, and even medical experts, tried to stop redneck solutions (patent infringement and that kind of all overshadowing important stuff).
And in yet other places the biggest problem is (but not all realize this as of yet) the lack of awareness and pro-activity while there is still time to come up with solutions.
So lets reflect on this a little bit. We all know that the medical finesse and degree of expertise consulted when there’s no other resources available except for your own bare hands and your own respiratory system is not always at the highest level when needed the most (like accidents out in the wild, a car accident or a cardiac arrest on the countryside, or whatever) but even as little resources as your bare hands can sometimes save lives.
I shouldn’t have to say this, but conventional and unconventional ways of life-saving is both taught and practiced on “different levels of sophistication”, so to speak. And one problem is that, despite even abundance of resources and expertise it also needs to be in the right place, in the right time, and in the right amount in order to be helpful.
And this is not always available everywhere it’s needed, even now, as we speak. And while I like it that there are experts working on solutions, I really don’t understand why they are doing it without sharing what parameters space to design for.
The “respiratory problem” is not about tomorrow, it’s about now.
In Italy doctor’s already decide which patients to try to keep alive and which patients to let die, in part because we still have not used our common imagination and inventive minds to create one of the simplest mechanical device that has even been designed - air pumps, with valves. People are dying as we speak. And yes, some individuals would die anyway but you wouldn’t know in advance which ones those individuals are, instead doctors have to decide which ones to let go of.
So I see absolutely no problem in regular rednecks looking for solutions (based on the understanding that there’s a problem coming) and enable using whatever they have available to try to save lives in cases when more sophisticated FDA approved devices are not available.
And even if medical staff take care of you I wouldn’t expect a whole team of exhausted ICU staff to continue try to bring you back for almost an hour after doctors think you are already gone beyond any (normal) chance of regaining functional pulmonary alveolus, which they did with my son. His wife (also into medicine) which made it to the emergency entrance at the same time as my son was brought there, told me after all the drama was over that also ICU staff can have that wild look in their eyes. Yes, they are true heroes.
Sorry for the long post.
// Rolf
However, “There’s always a solution” – Me
