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GM’s CEO Offers to Make Ventilators in WWII-Style Mobilization

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Re: GM’s CEO Offers to Make Ventilators in WWII-Style Mobilization

#241

Post by lsc »

jdc wrote: post #240
lsc wrote: post #239

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, remove the limiter, and how long does it take to make a doctor? I mean, sure, some people are saying that this thing is still gonna be here in four years (I am not a medical person, but that's what some of them say. something about the type of virus this is that will make a vaccine difficult) so that might not be a bad idea, but... I think we probably need to be focusing on how we can increase medical capacity…

Hell, we'll make it so med students can get a proper night's sleep during their residencies while we're at it.

the disrespect for sleep the medical profession has is insane.

If someone is gonna be cutting on me, I want them to have a good night's rest. They tell me to sleep consistently and well quite often. seems like if it's good for me it would be good for them, too.

Re: GM’s CEO Offers to Make Ventilators in WWII-Style Mobilization

#242

Post by _-___________-_ »

untog wrote: post #90
dmix wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's an overstatement of what he said. He had been posting about possible medical treatments [1], which is why the tweet you linked to starts with "That said" before talking about panicking and redirecting medical resources away from people who need it. Do you know why? The drug he was posting about before that tweet, `chloroquine`, is already facing shortages around the globe for people already on it for non-COVID…

He also literally said "The coronavirus panic is dumb": https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1236029449042198528

It doesn't seem unreasonable, even if it might be unhelpful. Most kinds of panic are dumb.

Re: GM’s CEO Offers to Make Ventilators in WWII-Style Mobilization

#243

Post by dingaling »

lutorm wrote: post #220
jacquesm wrote: post #182

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A commercialized health care system has lots of perverse incentives leading to price increases and profiteering. This sets the weakest fraction of the population up for losing all they've built up in the last 3 months of their life while barely impacting the strong. It also means that those hospitals don't care about overpaying for their supplies and medication (but not their workforce) because they get to pass those…

A commercialized health care system also has absolutely no incentive to keep excess capacity for emergencies. It seems to be very good at finding the optimal efficiency point, which essentially is very close to "no unused resources in the nimal situation". But societal resiliency requires that health care, utilities, food supply, etc, has some excess capacity just because at some point something will happen. A public…

> A commercialized health care system also has absolutely no incentive to keep excess capacity for emergencies.

I disagree, I'd say it's the opposite.

A commercial system can value surge capacity for peaks just like an online retailer does; the capacity to handle extra load means extra profit.

Whereas in a public health systems like the UK NHS everything is geared towards routine operational targets such as A&E waiting times. There is no budgetary or promotional reward for having reserve capacity.

Incidentally the NHS has just identified an unintended reserve: a pool of nurses who have been sitting in nadministrative middle-management roles for years. They are being retrained and redeployed now, but it illustrates the lack of efficiency in the system. A private provider would not have 'wasted' nursing staff in those positions.

Re: GM’s CEO Offers to Make Ventilators in WWII-Style Mobilization

#244

Post by int_19h »

lightgreen wrote: post #65
_2d30 wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's an idea of civic and social duty. The basic idea is that when one's society faces an existential crisis then those in that society with the means to help have a duty to do so. This is because the society in which they exist has provided them with a social structure that has, ideally, provided them with stability, some amount of prosperity, etc. It seems some people don't believe in this. It's sad. This isn't…

May I add a controversial comment again please? It will be downvoted again, sadly, I'll create a new account after this thread. People who say that Musk should use all his resources to help society, usually do nothing themselves (I'm not speaking about you personally). It's pure virtue signalling. Elon musk can loose 10% of his money switching from producing Teslas to producing ventilators. But everyone can use their…

10% of Musk's money is much less of a burden on Musk, marginal utility and all.

Re: GM’s CEO Offers to Make Ventilators in WWII-Style Mobilization

#245

Post by _-___________-_ »

vvanders wrote: post #56
lightgreen wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I guess people at the factory do few close contacts which can lead to virus transmission. And I guess they are supplied with hand sanitizers and handwashing is mandatory. On the other hand, people get paid, the factory is saved from bankruptcy so people can continue working in the factory even after the end of the outbreak. I'm not sure that closing the factory is a universally good decision for society. Edit: Englis…

Considering that the virus can live for up to 9 days on metal, glass or plastic[1] I'm not sure that mandatory hand washing is going to do much in an assembly line where everyone interacts directly vehicles on the line. [1] https://www.journalofhospitalinfection.com/article/S0195-670...

Those numbers really don't tell you anything about how viable surface transmission is as a vector from person to person. It doesn't seem to be a major transmission pathway based on all the available evidence so far.

Re: GM’s CEO Offers to Make Ventilators in WWII-Style Mobilization

#246

Post by _-___________-_ »

lightgreen wrote: post #40
vvanders wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, I'm as big of a Tesla fan as you'll find but the lack of closing the factory in one of the epicenters has really lowered my opinion of his leadership. While I understand he's one to zig when everyone zags I feel like this will be a case where it will become clear that it was a bad call.

I guess people at the factory do few close contacts which can lead to virus transmission. And I guess they are supplied with hand sanitizers and handwashing is mandatory. On the other hand, people get paid, the factory is saved from bankruptcy so people can continue working in the factory even after the end of the outbreak. I'm not sure that closing the factory is a universally good decision for society. Edit: Englis…

I wish more people could have this balanced viewpoint. Maybe it's a good decision, maybe it isn't, but the fact that there's a virus spreading shouldn't cause us to all get one-track minds all of a sudden.

People's economic situation is important to their health too, and their job is usually the biggest part of that.

Re: GM’s CEO Offers to Make Ventilators in WWII-Style Mobilization

#247

Post by mjevans »

iosjunkie wrote: post #225
jacquesm wrote: post #178

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You need to start thinking of this as a logistics problem, not a tech problem. Ventilators is a solved problem. What is needed is a stream of parts and manufacturing capability. I'm not sure if car manufacturers are the right partners but they do have a lot of people that know how to put stuff together. They can put an assembly line for ventilators together; get a stream of parts going and start manufacturing long be…

Let’s throw masks and other PPE onto your list as well.

Those are closer to nanomachine fabrication tasks, but different. Lots of specialized, uncommon, high-precision machines: everything is a one off, there is no bulk, and it's all expensive and fiddly.

Ironically the way to make this stuff cheaper would be a three-fold attack.

* Make MORE things that use the same parts, so that making the raw materials is commodity.

* Reduce waste in use (if sterilizing the filters for reuse / etc is possible, etc).

Part 3: Look for alternatives that are feasible.

A hot-zone (book) style line supplied breathing air positive pressure suit that can be scrubbed clean on the outside, OR a similar glove-box (negative draw?, scrubbed inside?) style phone-booth like I think I saw on TV from South Korea (IIRC) would be much better replacements.

Re: GM’s CEO Offers to Make Ventilators in WWII-Style Mobilization

#249

Post by _-___________-_ »

onetimemanytime wrote: post #191

>> Chief Executive Officer Elon Musk said the company would make ventilators if there is a shortage well, there is. Either get off Twitter or shoot a tweet to your underlings to get going. Pretty much countries will buy any ventilator that someone makes, money is no object.

Actually, right now there is not a shortage of ventilators. Few hospitals have ordered more, and there are large stocks. There probably will be a shortage soon, but unless someone orders them and guarantees payment it's hard to imagine any manufacturer re-tooling their factory and spinning up production on a wing and a prayer.
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