In Crowded Hospitals, Who Will Get Life-Saving Equipment?
April 3, 2020
(Wired) – But what would rationing a ventilator actually mean? To Wall, who also researches clinical bioethics at New York University, the answer was opaque. Would he be asked to prioritize by age, turning away the elderly, as some hospitals in Italy did? What if the choice was between an old person and a younger one who was far less healthy and more likely to die, even with a ventilator’s aid? What if that patient was a health care worker who might, in the weeks ahead, get better and save more people? The guidance was unclear.