UK Government forced to scale back on search for ventilators as report from US doctor suggests these may cause fatalities and there could be be better ways of treating Coronavirus

UK government forced to scale back on search for ventilators as report from US doctor suggests these may cause fatalities and there could be be better ways of treating Coronavirus.

WITH hospitals around the world struggling to get a hold of what are presumed life saving ventilators the shortage has forced the UK government to scale back on its long-term target of 30,000 of the invasive breathing machines being available during the Covid-19 health crisis.

However, new reports have shown that the death rate for those treated on ventilators is devastating. In one British study of 98 Covid-19 patients who were put on invasive breathing-support equipment, two-thirds died, according to the report by the Intensive Care National Audit and Research Centre. 

In New York, which has been hit particularly hard by the virus, 80 per cent of ventilated patients failed to recover. Dr David Farcy, the president of the American Academy of Emergency Medicine, warns against their use. His patients have been treated successfully with a different method of fast flow oxygen administered through a simple nasal tube or mask. He also places patients on their left or right side which instantly raises oxygen levels in their blood. 

Six weeks ago everybody would be running around getting ready to intubate you, put you on a machine. But not any more as doctors now have a remarkable new thesis, that the virus’s symptoms are similar to high altitude breathing difficulties or even carbon monoxide poisoning. In both instances, victims struggle for oxygen. But they do not have the ravaged lungs of pneumonia sufferers who are routinely put on ventilators.

Professor Sherif Sultan, the Ireland-based President of the International Society of Vascular Surgery believes that invasive ventilation is not a solution for Covid-19 as it does not resemble pneumonia or a similar respiratory ailment. He suggests that the vital clue that the coronavirus is different from pneumonia is in how it attacks the human body. It affects both lungs at the same time, which pneumonia rarely ever does.

Medical researchers in India also report that patients can be laughing one minute and at death’s door the next.  Rushing them to a ventilator may only make things worse as the machine takes over the breathing process of the patients who are heavily sedated so they cannot fight the sensation of not being able to breathe on their own. It pumps the lungs, but also sends oxygen to the vital organs, including the heart, brain and liver which need it to function.

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Damon Mitchell

From the interviewed to the interviewer

As frontman of a rock band Damon used to court the British press, now he lives the quiet life in Spain and seeks to get to the heart of the community, scoring exclusive interviews with ex-pats about their successes and struggles during their new life in the sun.

Originally from Scotland but based on the coast for the last three years, Damon strives to bring the most heartfelt news stories from the spanish costas to the Euro Weekly News.

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