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The U.S. gets a D- in the coronavirus fight. That stands for ‘disorganization,’ and it’s fixable
NEW YORK — Leora Horwitz has seen other disasters. Now the director of the Center for Healthcare Innovation and Delivery Science at New York University Langone Medical Center, she was a resident in a New York intensive care unit on Sept. 11, 2001, and chief resident during the blackout two years later. But working in the hospital to fight the novel coronavirus that has stopped the U.S. economy is like nothing she has ever experienced.
Normally transferring a single patient to the intensive care unit, or watching one die, is enough to ruin her week. Now, she is transferring one patient in five. “That’s just not normal,” said Horwitz. What’s worse is that to protect others from infection, patients are kept alone. “We’re setting up Skype so that they can see so they can see their actual faces and not just talk on the phone. We’re doing whatever we can, but they’re basically still alone.”
