This is from a Doctor on Staff for Nebraska Medicine..
This is an email from Nebraska Medicine critical care anesthesiologist Dan Johnson, MD, to his friends and family about the seriousness of COVID-19. It is shared with permission from Dr. Johnson.
Dear Family,
The COVID-19 pandemic will be a challenge to the USA unlike any we have experienced in our lifetime. For the last several weeks, I have been involved in multiple meetings each day where I get to hear the thoughts of experts in the field of pandemics, specifically about this pandemic, and what we need to do.
If anyone hears from family or friends who think this is “no big deal,” or that the USA’s response has been excessive, please know that they are very wrong. I’m sure you have all read about the many reasons that this is NOT “just like flu.” The numbers of infected, worldwide and in the USA, are extreme underestimates (because many infected have not been tested). The best metric to use, right now, is talking with hospital workers in the hotbeds, and asking them what their situation is.
I have been in communication with a friend who is a critical care physician from the Lombardy region of Italy. The health care workers there are living in a nightmare, having to decide who lives and who dies from lack of oxygen because their health care system is overwhelmed.
In the USA, we have three pathways for COVID-19:
- The country views this challenge like WWI and WWII, and almost everyone does the right things, and we will be harmed but okay.
- Many people do the right things, and many don’t, and we will have the same struggles that Italy is enduring.
- People blow this disease off as no big deal, and our health care system (and life as we know it) will be crippled.