Once a hospital reaches its ICU capacity, then healthcare workers will be forced to triage, Kumar warned.
“We will have to start making tough decisions on who can be admitted. Will it become a ‘first come, first served’ basis, and basically, once the ICU is full, anyone who comes after does not get life support? Or will the triage be based on, ‘who is likely to survive?’ It’s very scary to think about and it could come very soon,” he said.
Furness warned that if the virus continues to go unchecked in Canada, it’s very “predictable” what will happen.
“Look what happened in Italy and New York, and now what’s going on in Texas,” Furness said. “The health care system will run out of space, doctors and nurses will start getting sick, and patients will die in their beds.”
— With files from Heide Pearson and Shane Gibson, Global News, and The Canadian Press. SQI's RALI-dx™ COVID-19 Severity Triage Test measures five critical biomarkers including IL-6 in approximately 50-minutes to help clinicians determine severe inflammatory response in patients with COVID-19, Flu or any upper respiratory condition, can be treated and released for home care, should be admitted to a standard hospital unit to be monitored, or is likely to develop severe life-threatening symptoms and requires immediate intensive care unit (ICU) admittance and advanced respiratory care measures. The ability to effectively triage COVID-19 (or Flu) patients would be a diagnostic industry first. The Company, in collaboration with UHN. SQI intends to submit RALI-dx for EUA to FDA in late Q4 2020. The RALI-dx™ COVID-19 Severity Triage Test is expected to be used primarily in hospital emergency departments upon FDA approval.