The Associated Press reports that the “field hospitals” that were set up in New York City largely went unused:
NEW YORK (AP) — Gleaming new tent hospitals sit empty on two suburban New York college campuses, never having treated a single coronavirus patient. Convention centers that were turned into temporary hospitals in other cities went mostly unused. And a Navy hospital ship that offered help in Manhattan is soon to depart.
When virus infections slowed down or fell short of worst-case predictions, the globe was left dotted with dozens of barely used or unused field hospitals. Some public officials say that’s a good problem to have — despite spending potentially billions of dollars to erect the care centers — because it’s a sign the deadly disease was not nearly as cataclysmic as it might have been.
When is it preparedness and when is it panic? The argument articulated above (“it’s a good problem to have…”) suggests that no cost is associated with allocating resources for facilities that are never used but that isn’t true.
Panic? Panic? But. But. Ferguson and Fauci provided ranges. Ranges, you see. /sarc
Its a bit like hurricanes. Evacuate and no hurricane and you look stupid. Dont evacuate and maybe you get a New Orleans Katrina. You always know what you should have done after the fact. Good thing the lockdowns worked.
Steve
The analogy between hurricanes and the epidemic would be more apt if the federal government’s response to Katrina would have been to order the Army to shell Biloxi, New Orleans, and Houston.
I don’t see any conflict between panic and preparedness. The measures taken in hindsight seem entirely prudent to me, even if they were not needed in the end.
I do come at this from my military experience where preparedness is a big part of what the military does. We stage assets and personnel to cover contingencies that very often aren’t needed and don’t get used. Hard experience has taught us that it’s better to have those things in place in case something unexpected happens.
In another thread a couple of months ago, I wrote that we should do the same thing for future pandemics. We should have equipment and supplies stored and maintained, areas identified, plans in place that can be quickly modified to suit the situation. Had that been done we wouldn’t have faced severe shortages of PPE and other critical items for one example.
None of that would be panicking – quite the opposite. Prudent preparation is the means to avoid panic, it’s not the gateway to panic.
One of my favorite analogies for emergencies prepared for but never occurring are nuclear weapons. It’s hard for anybody to fathom how much time, effort, and expense were put into designing, building, and deploying the tens of thousands of nuclear weapons from the late 1940’s well into this century to ensure that if the Russians decided to start the Last War (assuming they didn’t bully us into surrendering without a fight) we’d finish it. I’m old enough to have participated in nuclear explosion drills in schools (I was young enough then to have thought them a fun break from school work). ‘The Bomb’ and what it symbolized was ever-present in most people’s minds. It was all about being prepared for an emergency – to counter with devastating force any attempt to enslave the world – that never occurred because that devastating force was in place to stop it. Yes, it’s trillions of dollars wasted that could have been much more wisely spent elsewhere. But because the Last War never occurred because of this ’emergency’ preparedness, we are able to ponder what might have been had we had those trillions back to spend, instead of living in grinding poverty as chattels of the state. Apologists for the glories of Marxist-Leninist-Maoism need not reply to this diatribe, go straight to hell without passing ‘Go’ and spend your time there translating ‘The Gulag Archipelago’ and ‘The Killing Fields’ into whatever languages the devil requires you to.
Military analogy breaks down because of deterrence. Viruses are unaffected by deterrence. If we had stocked masks and other PPE gear in 1990 when it looked like we had money, would it have been any good 30 years later? I suppose that’s a strength of a free market economy, production is so high we can afford misappropriation which is inevitable anyway.
” Prudent preparation is the means to avoid panic”
Lets also not forget that if hospitals were maintaining enough ventilators and PPE and drugs to combat a pandemic we would get regular posts about hospital costs and never needing to use the stuff . As a wise man said…. ” that no cost is associated with allocating resources for facilities that are never used but that isn’t true.” Just change facilities to ventilators, etc.
Actually Dave’s post made me think of baseball which I am missing. The USO gave a me a lot of free tickets to Phillies games in the early 70s, when Carlton was unhittable at times. Made me think “if only those poor hitters had known it was a slider they wouldnt have been swinging at balls in the dirt.”.
Steve
“Military analogy breaks down because of deterrence.”
It’s not only or even mainly about deterrence. It’s about having the plans and resources in place for contingencies or worst-case scenarios. We had, for example, tens of thousands of body bags for Desert Storm and Iraqi Freedom, plus a surplus of medical capabilities that went unused. We have quick reaction forces placed in different parts of the globe to rescue/assist/recover from any surprises. After Benghazi, we have plans and assets dedicated to support the State Department so that incident is not repeated.
I look at it more like firefighters. We pay to have trained people and equipment on standby and most of the time they do nothing, but they are ready when something big happens.
“If we had stocked masks and other PPE gear in 1990 when it looked like we had money, would it have been any good 30 years later?”
Not without maintenance and replacement. Those are costs that would have to be factored in, preparation isn’t a one-time expense.
“Lets also not forget that if hospitals were maintaining enough ventilators and PPE and drugs to combat a pandemic we would get regular posts about hospital costs and never needing to use the stuff”
Well, that’s why I think maintaining the resources for contingency responses is a good role for the federal and state governments. Socializing the cost to provide and maintain that capability is a very good value IMO.
The problem with all of this discussion is that it must be subjected to cost-benefit analysis. It’s not that more preparedness is good and less preparedness is bad. It’s how much are you willing to spend to be how prepared? That’s a political judgment.
And in the context of current events and priorities, which may be all wrong. But that’s the cost you bear, or don’t and regret it.
Why are those facilities not being used?
They are suitable for isolating and monitoring mild cases.
Monitoring mild cases improves response times if they deteriorate. It also keeps from patients transmitting to others in their home or care facility.
Singapore is fully utilizing its expo center that got turned into a field hospital — for treating and isolating mild cases.
If you are going to build it, utilize it! The epidemic is not over.
I do get the political judgment argument.
One little known program within the DoD has established and maintained war reserve stocks of equipment, ammunition, etc. for use by our allies in addition to all the stocks for our own military. It seems a bit bizarre to me that we can directly fund the wartime reserve supplies for foreign countries, but we can’t for pandemics that kill tens-of-thousands of Americans.
We could have a well-resourced capability put in place and maintained for future pandemics if Congress would consistently allocate the funds. Even though doing that seems like a no-brainer to me, I understand that Congress has much different priorities as the neglect of the national medical stockpile demonstrates.
Do I remember correctly, DOD has about a dozen locations in the U.S. for purposes of quarantine? Its my understanding that this was a hobby horse of Bush II and he got a few more added back, but there were like five times as many during the cold war.
Practically anything can be sold to the American people in the form of defense spending. Keep in mind that, other than expeditions in Afghanistan, Iraq, and Syria (big exceptions), we’ve been cutting defense spending for decades. If you oppose defense spending without recognizing that “defense spending” covers a lot of ground including things that are not strictly defense, you wish you lived in another country.
“The problem with all of this discussion is that it must be subjected to cost-benefit analysis. It’s not that more preparedness is good and less preparedness is bad. It’s how much are you willing to spend to be how prepared? That’s a political judgment.”
And there you have it. And its also a “reasonable man” (legal context) judgement. Being Henny Penny is easy. Any fool can do it. The truth is that bureaucrats and the medical profession simply blindly, and irresponsibly, went to the worst case. Easy for them. There are 30 MM unemployed who might differ. The oh-so-easy sloughing off of the reckless prescriptions is both illuminating and saddening.