America’s Hospitals Have Never Experienced Anything Like This
If they run out of space, where will all the sick people go?
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When COVID-19 first started showing up at the UC San Francisco Medical Center in February, the hospital set up triage tents, canceled elective surgeries, and created a whole new ICU in the now-empty surgery-recovery area. But what if all of that isn’t enough? If a surge of coronavirus cases overwhelms the hospital in the coming weeks, the remaining options become more and more drastic: putting beds in a waiting room and then in hallways outside the ER, and then—if necessary—a gymnasium across the street.
“Nobody wants to go there,” , an
