HOW CAN WE KEEP OUT OF HOSPITAL IF WE GET COVID-19?
How could that help us exit lockdown?

A COVID-19 ward - worth avoiding!
I keep hearing COVID-19  is a mild disease for most people.  Indeed children rarely show symptoms.

Yet this disease has put the world into a tailspin.  In the UK tens of thousands have died across a wide age range, life as we know it has ground to a halt and we now face a bigger recession than we had in 2008.  Yet still no end in sight.  Furthermore, the public finances are in tatters and sooner or later we’re going to have to pay for it all.

Why the problem and the lockdown response?  Was a lockdown avoidable? Either way, what can we do now to keep ourseves out of hospital and help exot lockdown to reduce further social and economic damage?

WHY?

The reason for the problem is that a small minority of people become seriously ill, and some of them don’t survive.  Often with another serious illness, but often not. Sadly enough people to threaten to overstretch the NHS and result in the type of dreadful situation we saw early on in Italy.  A lockdown here in the UK became essential as a rapid way to reduce transmission, and avoid such scenes.


WAS A LOCKDOWN AVOIDABLE?

With hindsight, certainly.    That’s a separate discussion.  What I want to focus on is the future.


WHAT CAN WE DO NOW TO KEEP OUT OF HOSPITAL, EXIT LOCKDOWN AND REDUCE FURTHER DAMAGE?

As part of my contribution towards the fight against COVID-19 I am helping a University Professor with a research project about the “Got it” RT-PCR swab tests. 

This involves reviewing articles written by academics and medics about COVID-19 to identify relevant data.  In batches of 500 articles.  It’s giving me the opportunity to review all sorts of other topics.

The topic I am especially looking out for is how can people avoid a mild illness becoming serious enough to need to go to hospital?

If we can solve that, in combination wth anti-transmision measures, normal life could resume.  At least if we could bring down serious illness occurrence to be comparable in numbers to complications from flu.

Not easy without a vaccine.  But isn’t the objective of keeping more people out of hospital important?

Yet so far I have found no article specifically aimed at that objective.  And nothing that specific I’ve seen in the media.  If you spot something, do please add it into the comments below.


PM JOHNSON’S EXPERIENCE

PM Johnson had a nasty illness comparable to flu for a few days at home, then got somewhat better.

But when the illness didn’t totally disappear, he got worse again.  It was then that it was serious enough to need hospital treatment, and he himself acknowledges that he could have died were it not for the treatment he received.

My understanding is two-phases like his are commonplace.  I have my own pet theory related to there being two antibodies produced at different times.  But I’m struggling to find proof that two phases are the most common situation, and why serious illness occurs in just some people.

I’m hoping that the objective of keeping people out of hospital is put right towards the top of the priority list.  Is it yet?


HOW CAN PEOPLE REDUCE THE CHANCE OF NEEDING HOSPITAL TREATMENT?

For my own sake, I wanted to know what I could do to keep out of hospital should I contract the disease.

Amazingly I found nothing on the NHS web site beyond usual treatment for fever,  nor indeed anywhere else obvious.

Today there’s a little more advice about breathing on the NHS web site, but not much.  Nothing about the deep-breathing exercises used in hospitals, for example, that are easy to do at home and can help to avoid the disease taking hold at the base of the lungs.  Not the best of videos, but if re-done professionally would be really useful!

What else can we do?  It strikes me this needs to be the key focus of research.

There are drugs that treat other viral infections being researched, but there are no proven treatments for other coronaviruses like SARS, MERS and some common colds. We can hope for something shortly, but more likely nothing useful until 2021.

So what other simple ideas might there be in the meantime that anyone can do at home? Are there ideas out there, but not being collected and communicated?

A quick internet search for “coronavirus keeping out of hospital” disclosed nothing except encouraging people with other serious conditions to go to hospital.  Important, but not what I wanted.

Indeed nothing useful for what I wanted.


IN CONCLUSION

If we could find ways to keep people with COVID-19 out of hospital , it would be good for you and me, and help the counrtry exit lockdown.  Isn't that objective fundamental to our future?  Research is needed quickly.  That will help enormously to get back to some form of ‘normal’. 

Action please!

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