Whenever I see these outbreak stories (sars, mers, etc..) and it affects a US citizen, I always wonder who actually pays for this level of intensive care.<p>Ambulance trips in the states are routinely $3,000. my trip to the ER after a wreck was $3800. If you dont have insurance, how do you pay for an "isopod" and a quarantine with a medical robot? What reasonable insurance company would ever cover these expenses? (mine hardly covers birth control.)<p>Healthcare is private here. When i go to the hospital they ask if "i am a member." Do these treatments take place at in-network facilities? is there such a thing as an in-network facility for being quarantined with an incurable new disease? Can I be compelled to pay for health services in this case if i DO NOT want them?<p>Its at least reassuring to see CNN is dancing around the HIPAA implicationf of misidentifying or identifying the patient...although I wonder if its only because they recently emerged from a slander/libel lawsuit for painting a highschool kid from kentucky as a racist during a rally.
Can someone explain why /this/ level of isolation is necessary?<p>I understand that comparison of mortality rates is difficult, so this does seem "more deadly" than the flu, but likely we have no idea of the actual number of people with it, both for reporting reasons and because many people may just have minor symptoms.<p>But, if we use SARS as a comparison which also had this level of pandemic fear+isolation (and was way way worse handled in China at the beginning) I think final stats were like 1000 deaths worldwide. Compare that to what, over 2k deaths in just the US every year from the flu?<p>I'm not saying we shouldn't be concerned (it is new and unknown, and seems to have a higher mortality rate than other viruses) but it seems this level of treatment (and entire city-wide lockdowns in China right now) is like Ebola level precautions for what seems like a difficult but fairly standard level respiratory virus?<p>Honestly curious here from medical professionals/epidemiologists..
Slightly related and not worth it's own post, but someone in Chicago has been diagnosed with the coronavirus, making them the second person in the US with it.<p><a href="https://www.chicagotribune.com/news/breaking/ct-coronavirus-china-epidemic-illinois-case-20200124-yx2xd3yeovar3o25ei6bfvvbze-story.html" rel="nofollow">https://www.chicagotribune.com/news/breaking/ct-coronavirus-...</a>
I would like to take this moment to say that the virus is very serious and any people thinking of traveling to China in the next few months should strongly reconsider. Death counts and infected counts coming out of China seem to not be very accurate, as they don't match other organization's models.
They've had these telepresence robots for a while. Good for this scenario - reducing contact with an infectious patient - and super useful for rural clinics that might not be able to staff an in-person full-time doc.