America's hospitals will be overrun with coronavirus in just EIGHT DAYS: Obama's Medicare boss issue

[Native]

Source: Daily Mail

America's hospitals will be overrun with coronavirus in just EIGHT DAYS: Obama's Medicare boss issues dire warning as doctors say as many as 500,000 are already infected and 10 MILLION will need care

There are only 790,000 hospital beds 100,000 ICU beds total in all of the hospitals across the country
Dr. Marty Makary warned people not to believe the current figures that only 2,200 are infected
He says the true number is likely far more and that as many as half a million people already have it
Dr. Makary urged people to be more vigilant said 'we're about to experience the worst epidemic since polio'
Johns Hopkins predicts 9.6 million people will need to be hospitalized and 3 million will need ICU care
Doctors and nurses fear the hospital system, which is already overrun by the flu season, may buckle
In Italy, doctors are having to choose between critically ill people to treat because resources are short

America's hospitals will be overrun with coronavirus patients in just eight days and face months of strain, according to Obama's former Medicare boss.

Andy Slavitt, former Acting Administrator of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, issued the dire warning on Twitter on Saturday along with a string of advice for the public, governments and health workers.

'Last night I was on with state & local officials around the US well into the night.

'By March 23 many of our largest cities & hospitals are on course to be overrun with cases,' he wrote.

Slavitt then listed highlights from the memo he had prepared which included telling people to self-isolate now, closing bars and restaurants, frantically sourcing medical supplies 'even from the black market' if necessary and gearing up for the 'tsunami' of patients that will soon arrive at hospitals.

'The stakes are higher than any most of us have ever experienced: wars, 9/11, whatever,' he later added.

Read more: https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8112063/America-braces-coronvirus-collapse-100-00-ICU-beds-10-MILLION-hospitalized.html

---

Not to be missed is the COVID-19 Lag Tracker chart that shows where we and other countries are in comparison to Italy. Lots of pictures too. Oh, and there is one ventilator for every 8 people in the U.S. who will likely need one.

P.S. I took the liberty of posting more than 4 paras since 3 of the 6 I've posted consist of one sentence each. Kill me now.

P.S.S. - Original post in General Disc. by MelissaB

[Newest Reality]

1. K&R

[vlyons]

2. But do we see Trump using FEMA and the Army Engr Corp setting up temporary hospitals?

Nooooooooooooooo

[Steelrolled]

3. Love the use of CAPITAL LETTERS in the headline.

[Mr.Bill]

4. Just my opinion, but

alarmist British press seems to be assuming everyone wo gets the virus will need to be hospitalized. This is very far from the truth.

[mucifer]

5. My gut keeps telling me this is nothing. BUT my brain keeps saying "shut up and listen

to expert scientists and not your damn gut!"

So far my brain is keeping me in check.

[Mr.Bill]

8. The British press doesn't necessarily

consist of expert scientists. Their standards there are closer to the National Enquirer than the Washington Post.

[Native]

18. Don't people read this stuff before slamming it? I mean even Faux News gets it right some times.

And look who's throwing stones. Everything that's being reported in the U.S. is simply lie after lie after lie by our own administration, AND in the middle of a pandemic.

[Mr.Bill]

19. I think every one here is pretty much

aware that the Trump administration lies about everything. And I did read the whole article.

[Native]

22. I find it hard to believe you did. They never say everyone will need to be hospitalized as you claim

From the article: The estimate of how many more people are going to become infected ranges wildly but congress's doctor has said as many as 150 million people may become infected, and Johns Hopkins says as many as 10 million may need to be hospitalized because of it. Etc....

[Mr.Bill]

23. Okay, you win. We're all gonna die.

[Native]

37. Give it a rest.

[Mr.Bill]

40. I could say the same to you.

[Native]

41. If you'd like to have the last word, 'cause it sure does look like you're the type - go ahead,

and I won't respond. Enjoy!

[ToxMarz]

7. Alarmist is right

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daily_Mail

Other criticisms

The Mail's medical and science journalism has been criticised by some doctors and scientists, accusing it of using minor studies to generate scare stories.[16][17][15

[Renew Deal]

51. The person writing the tweets doesn't work for them.

[MelissaB]

9. The info comes from Andy Slavitt who worked for Obama.

He is the former Acting Administrator of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services.

[Mr.Bill]

10. So says the unreliable

British press.

[defacto7]

12. We'll see in a few days, won't we?

[MelissaB]

16. Lordy! It shows screen shots from his twitter feed. Here is his feed:

https://twitter.com/ASlavitt

And the actual thread:

Link to tweet

[Renew Deal]

53. What does that mean?

You think they are forgeries?

[mahina]

60. Are you kidding?

You don’t accept Slavitt’s credibility on public health matters?

I hope you are joking.

[Steelrolled]

15. In typical tabloid fashion

This article mixes statements between multiple people, in this an administrator and a doctor.

[Native]

14. the British press is interviewing solid experts in the U.S. here.

[NickB79]

39. Dr. Fauci has already stated 20% of infected require hospitalization

He is very far from alarmist.

[PoindexterOglethorpe]

52. I guess the 80% who don't require hospitalization don't count?

Me, I'm a glass is half full kind of person.

[NickB79]

58. No, because we're discussing hospitals being swamped by patients

In what context does your question even make sense? 20% hospitalized out of 25% of the US population is 16 million people.

And a 25% infection rate is on the low end of estimates.

[bucolic_frolic]

6. To date only a few states shutdown, and fewer school systems

It's coming. They have no idea how many active cases, how many carriers. Estimates depend on statistical estimates using foreign rates.

[Lulu KC]

11. More from Dr. Makary, if the Daily Mail doesn't sit well with you

https://www.wusa9.com/article/news/health/coronavirus/coronavirus-impacts-expected-for-3-months/65-23133e62-f2cf-49e9-a7c1-8b9ae1136b02

[Mr.Bill]

13. That's far more sensible

than the article in the OP.

[Native]

17. Dr. Makary says the same thing in both articles.

And not everything in the article is attributable to Makary. Slavitt's twitter thread is important information as well. I don't understand the prejudice against an article just because it's a British publication when all it does is quote a few experts and reproduces a twitter thread by Obama's Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Administrator.

[Mr.Bill]

20. But the Daily Mail article

said more than the Doctor said.

[Lulu KC]

21. Yes

That is why I posted this. I don't get it either, but we all have our hangups. I think he's pretty credible!

[Bernardo de La Paz]

26. Understand the reluctance to take the TIME to read a source that has been unreliable in the past.

It is certainly NOT "just because it is a British publication". Guardian for example is excellent, as is the BBC and others.

We could not know it is as you described (I have not visited the OP link) before you described it or before clicking the link for which the time divided by expected-quality ratio was too high.

Thanks LuLuKC for the WUSA9 link, which I read. Unfortunately it had one of those autorun videos on a completely unrelated topic that I had to deal with, but nonetheless I'm glad to have read the article.

[Native]

24. The Graph

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/ETErg4GXkAUllgT?format=jpg&name=900x900

It shows how far behind Italy we are tracking in days & how our trajectory compares. The US and every country that hasn’t taken better preventive measures like S Korea & Japan is directly on course, lagging 2 weeks behind.

[DeminPennswoods]

25. In Italy, people live in multigenerational households,

there is a daily "cocktail hour", they cook and dine with friends and families every day. Although there are more mutli-general households in the US now, Americans simply do not organize our lives around daily social and leizure activities with family the way Italians do. Americans organize their lives around work, work and more work. Comparing what's happening in Italy to what might happen elsewhere is like comparing apples and oranges.

FTR, Slavitt did a 2 year stint as acting director of CMS, 3 years ago. He's not a doctor or trained in medicine. He's a business school grad, former investment banker at Goldman, consultant with McKinsey, started a healthcare/insurance company, then sold it to UnitedHealthCare and ran one of that companies divisions.

Much like Seth Abramson, Slavitt has hyperventilated over many things since he left government service.

[Native]

28. He doesn't claim to be a doctor. Geez.

Hyperventilate? Good to know you have a low opinion of Abramson and Slavitt. I'll keep that in mind when I read your posts in the future.

Oh, and I've heard those crazy Italians also like to play cards! Looks like the U.K. is going to implode as well. I wonder what excuse we'll be hearing about their social mores that make their situation so unlike anything that can happen here.

FTR, the chart shows 8 countries all clustered around Italy.

[DeminPennswoods]

30. Obviously, people are getting sick, but they're

recovering, too. And did Slavitt or any of the other fear-mongers mention the fact that in American many, if not most, of the at risk population have had not 1, but 2 types of pneumonia vaccine within the last several years? It's something that was asked of my parents every time I took them for a regular check up. If they weren't up to date, they got one or both if needed. The virus causing pneumonia is what's deadly about it. Maybe more people are protected from adverse outcomes than anyone realizes?

Maybe you should have caught MSNBC's interview with Seattle's mayor. She was quite calm and rational and her city is in the middle of it.

Since in the US, we have precious little data on which to draw conclusions, it is simply irresponsible to make or cite projections that are based on some set of assumptions that may/may not be true, may/may not apply or both.

[Native]

31. The double interstitial pnemonia that people get from Covid-19 is viral not bacterial!

Vaccines only protect you from bacterial pneumonia.

It is also irresponsible to infer that people are idiots for not getting vaccines, when clearly you are the one who is ill informed.

[csziggy]

43. The assumption may be that people are dying of secondary infections

As often happens with the flu. If that were the case, pneumonia vaccinations would be a very good idea. From what I have read, it is the original coronavirus that is causing the catastrophic damage to the lungs that kills so quickly.

But I doubt the public and maybe most of the doctors will get a clear understanding about this pandemic until after it is mostly over.

[Native]

45. Secondary infection - that was my rationale for getting the shot last week, but the docs I spoke to

told me it was a waste of time in that regard, but I figured with my luck I'd get Covid-19, recover, and then 3 weeks later get a bacterial lung infection and kick the bucket. I mean, I could be 9 months pregnant, fall off a 20-story building, and I guarantee you I'd live just long enough to experience the pain of labor.

[csziggy]

46. Yeah - until I got my pneumonia shot, every time I got the flu I got pneumonia

So I worry about that. Since I have had the pneumonia vaccine and regular flu shots, I haven't had either.

I do get upper respiratory infections often but not anywhere near as bad as I used to. But at 67 and with that history, I am keeping an eye on the Corvid-19 reports. I can't isolate since we are adding onto the house and they are getting ready to rip part of the roof off to add the roof for the new part.

[Native]

47. I've been through some major remodeling and building situations myself - calling the CDC because

your 6 month old has crawled into wet concrete was my least concern... But not being able to isolate is totally not cool! Did you see the latest - that the CDC wanted everyone over 60 to isolate, but Trump put the kibosh on that? What are you doing to minimize your exposure. Please tell me you're not on the west coast!

[csziggy]

48. I'm in North Florida but I haven't heard of any cases in our county

Mostly I just stay at a distance from the workers. Usually I shake hands, but I don't do that anymore. I've always washed my hands a lot - to the point my husband claims I am OCD, but it's a good habit to have whether or not there is a pandemic. Today we went shopping at Costco - needed to fill our newly repaired freezer. So now we're set for food for a few months

The most dangerous part from the pandemic point of view is yet to come. Along with the wiring for the new part, we're changing some lights for the old part of the house, so the electrician will be working inside. At least we're not doing any plumbing since we're just adding a new living room so we will not be without water at all.

I was a little disappointed to wake up the morning after the slab was poured to not find deer tracks across the concrete. They'd been wandering around at night right up until that one. I'd set up trail cams to be able to put together a video of the construction so we caught them several times before. The stray cats stayed to the other side of the house, but the prep for the carport enlargement spooked them away.

[Native]

49. Sounds like you're doing as much as you can given the circumstances

I'm in Florida too. Tampa Bay area. Please tell me you'll make your electrician wash his hands the minute he enters your home! We simply have to be comfortable advocating for ourselves!

Sounds like you're in a nice area with some privacy and land - I've never had that - we're on a golf course now (not a fan), and I pretty much lived on the water growing up and as an adult for about 20 years before we moved to this home. I miss the water, and I've always wanted to have some acreage and woods, but now I'm likely too old to manage a spread like that.

Deer tracks in your foundation would have been cool!

[csziggy]

50. Yeah, there is only so much you can insist on the workers doing

And expect them to do their jobs. I've got a good immune system for the most part, so I'm not too worried.

We're on a 60 acre farm, have owned it for over 40 years. We do everything we can to encourage the wildlife so they take us for granted. Things like this construction disrupt their lives, but they will settle back in once it's done. I can't manage the place myself anymore and have to hire out the mowing and other chores. I hate that!

My sister lives just north of Tampa, technically in Lutz. I couldn't live in a city - too many people! We grew up in Bartow so I know the area pretty well as it was in the 1960s. It's totally changed since I left in 1972.

I read about one family who had a sidewalk poured and when they checked back on it, there were duck tracks all over it. WE're not near enough to water to wish for that, but deer tracks - or fox tracks - would have been cool.

[Native]

59. We had a porpoise flop onto our boat deck while my mom was watching the house for us.

She had to call wildlife control to have them help it back into the Gulf. That and the Blue Herons that visited regularly were about as critterfied as we ever got. Your spread sounds wonderful!!!!

[sarisataka]

27. Bookmarked

Will come back on the 23rd

[Native]

29. I'm putting my money on the 28th. Irish humor, what can I say.

[Hekate]

32. When confronted with single-sentence paragraphs....

... I consolidate.

Thanks for the article.

[Native]

35. thanks

[Chainfire]

33. I sure hope

that that prediction is fake news intended to hurt Trump.

[Native]

36. That would be the best fake news ever - on so many levels!

[PSPS]

34. Alarmist click-bait from the daily mail. Ignore.

First, anything with words in caps in the headline is suspect
Second, this is the Daily Mail
Third, this is a rehash of what Andy Slavitt said and he's unqualified and no "expert." He has an MBA, ran the CMS for a couple of years and is not even a doctor.

[Native]

38. Thank you for your professional, unprofessional opinion.

I'm glad you've pointed out that Slavitt is not a doctor. I don't understand how that doesn't make him qualified to give his opinion, but I guess Obama didn't have a clue when he hired him to run the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid. So you certainly got me there. Looks like all the state and local officials that asked for his opinion are equally as clueless. But don't stop there, don't you have something you can enlighten us with that will throw shade on the expert (thank God he's a doctor) from Johns Hopkins who's also quoted?

Tabloid type papers are pretty common in Europe. If I discounted CAPS, I'd have read very little during my visits there.

Yeah, the Daily Mail has it's faults, but like I said before, even Faux News gets it right from time to time. Moreover, I don't know why it's okay for an OP to be a Twitter thread, but the minute that thread with 3 of 4 comments from a Johns Hopkins doc is posted via the Daily Mail, it's not to be entertained for even a second.

As far as alarmist? Where the heck have you been hiding yourself these days? Every flipping thing in the news has been ALARMING.

Go find a bar in New Rochelle - nothing to worry about.

[PSPS]

42. The guy is a charlatan. Obama didn't appoint him for his medical expertise (he has none.)

Maybe you don't know, but CMS is a huge accounting enterprise that manages Medicare payments. That's all it does. An MBA would be a good match for that because it does absolutely nothing at all related to medical diagnosis and treatments. That's left to qualified people. You know. Like real MD's and stuff.

So this guy gives all these tabloid "news" sites some harebrained quote that is being exaggerated anyway just for shock value. Gotta get them clicks!!11!

Anyway, if you're looking for some alarmist story that makes things seem like Armageddon, have at it. Sure, things are bad. But that's no excuse for publishing, let alone believing, such tripe as "America's hospitals will be overrun with coronavirus in just EIGHT DAYS: Obama's Medicare boss issues dire warning as doctors say as many as 500,000 are already infected and 10 MILLION will need care." The guy never said this in the first place. He was referring to the entire world. But the tabloid sites like Raw Story, Daily Mail and that ilk twist it to imply it's all in the US. The US has about 4% of the world's population.

[Native]

44. Ok, let's unpack this. Got some stuff for you to look at....

This is Dr. Makary's interview on Yahoo Finance where he states, as is pointed out in the article, that we only have about 100,000 ICU beds, and we'll need anywhere from 200,000 to 2 million. He also states that he believes we currently (the interview was yesterday) have between 50,000 and half a million cases right now walking around in the United States. The same thing that is stated in this Daily Mail article. https://finance.yahoo.com/video/dr-marty-makary-coronavirus-think-145547356.html

As far as America's hospitals being overrun in 8 days - they're already overrun in certain cities on the West Coast. That's been reported by just about every decent source in the U.S., and it's getting worse, naturally.

As far as a guy with an MBA being asked by governors and local officials for advice - remember, they are not just managing the medical side of the virus. There is a lot that goes on administratively that has to be worked out too. Having worked on both sides of the health care industry (the insurance side and hospital administration), I can attest to that - although it is pretty much a common sense deduction here. If you look at his advice, he clearly states that what he's advocating is info he's gotten from the experts he's spoken to - he never professes to be an expert. Everything I read in his thread appears to be nothing more than what I've read elsewhere in the mainstream news.

And your comment that "the guy never said this," referencing the '10 million who may need care' comment is correct. But if you go back and reread the article, you'll see that they never said he did.

As for those alarming numbers that you assumed represented global figures, they're all US of A, baby. The article was quoting other experts, namely Congress' doctor (I know you think very highly of doctors), who has said as many as 150 million people in the U.S. may become infected, and you can find this same quote on NBC, WaPo, and Axios https://www.axios.com/congressional-physician-predicts-75-150-million-us-coronavirus-cases-fec69e77-1515-4fbc-8340-c53b65c22c53.html.

The article also states that Johns Hopkins says as many as 10 million may need to be hospitalized because of it. Considering that experts believe 80% of those infected will recover and the rest will need some kind of medical care (a term the article also uses, but "medical care" doesn't necessarily mean hospitalization - which people are sure to incorrectly assume that it does), that leaves 20% needing some level of medical care - be that a prescription and a simple visit to the doctor's office or a spell in the ICU leading to the morgue (wanted to get an alarming plug in here for effect). That would be 30 million people. I don't think it's a stretch to think that 1/3 of those may end up requiring hospital care.

And CBS is confirming what this article states: "The U.S Department of Health and Human Services estimates if the coronavirus outbreak becomes "very severe" about 38 million Americans will need medical care and nearly 10 million will need to stay in hospitals. Adriana Diaz reports here: https://www.cbsnews.com/video/federal-government-estimates-about-38-million-americans-will-need-medicare-care-amid-coronavirus-concern/

Bottom line: I am well aware of the Daily Mail's reputation. I saw this post originally in the GD forum. I asked the OP to post it in LBN. She said to feel free to post it. I checked several of the quotes to make sure the reporting was legit, and it appeared to be so.

I hope the next time you decide to trash something IN THE MIDDLE OF A PANDEMIC, you'll take the time to verify it's contents instead of flippantly disregarding it in it's entirety.

I know the numbers are scary. Numbers are what I've worked with for a living. Don't be so quick to 'discount' them. And I hope you appreciate how much restraint I had to call up to refrain from ALL CAPPING a few other things for you.

[PoindexterOglethorpe]

54. I'm a bit confused. If 500,000 are infected, why would twenty times that number need

care? What exactly am I missing here?

[PolarPop]

55. Because they don't know they're infected

Which means they are infecting others. If the article is true, it’s literally about to explode by the end of the month.

Or... it won’t and we can all laugh at the people with thousands of bottles of hand sanitizer and 6 months worth of toilet paper.

[PoindexterOglethorpe]

56. I've been seeing the

"the numbers are about to explode in a week or two" for a month now.

I tend to think in terms of, if everyone gets infected quickly, this will play out quickly. Not a popular opinion, I know.

In any case, the vast majority of those infected have few or no symptoms. Yes, that may well be why this is spreading so fast, but am I the only person on the planet who thinks that the apparently vast numbers of asymptomatic carriers is at worst an okay thing?

[Native]

57. Simple explanation....

The reason that you have been hearing that the numbers are going to explode for the last several weeks is because that was based on faulty information from our administration that testing was widely available, which then turned into "will be available next week," which then turned into the following week. They are now saying that it will be probably be the end of next week before testing is readily available. Expecting the numbers to explode was based on testing; if you're not testing, you won't have confirmed cases. As you've probably read, that was Trump's plan from the beginning - don't test to keep the numbers low so his re-election won't be compromised..

[sarisataka]

61. It has been EIGHT DAYS,

Since these predictions were made.

The US hospital system is not overrun with patients. We do not have 10,000,000 cases in the U.S. The world total today is about 352,000. The U.S. has approximately 10% of the total cases.

The world total today falls far short of the supposed half million cases the US had a week ago.


So does it help preparedness in any way when alarmist drek such as this is published? I would put forth such wildly inaccurate predictions actually cause more harm by inducing panic in the general population and likely health care providers who may have believed this.

[JmAln]

62. That news story didn't age well.

7 days later there have been 414 deaths, barely a blip on the radar in a population of 350 million. A doctor in Seattle was saying cases are leveling off. Maybe this thing will blow up nationally but it hasn't yet.

[DeminPennswoods]

63. LOL!

No, it did not.