by LROBBINS » 12 Apr 2020, 22:40
At least in the case of Italy, I have great difficulty believing this. In part I don't believe it because, despite massive, detailed, coverage and in which government decrees are printed in full, there's been no mention of this. And the other, probably more important reason, is that the pressure on Italian hospitals is now decreasing steadily -- for at least the last week or so, there have been fewer new cases per day, about 100 fewer patients each day in intensive care and the daily death toll has been about halved. The worst zone remains Lombardia, the first area hit and where the infection was allowed to spread before serious area-wide lockdowns were implemented. Where people contact has been inhibited (though surely not completely stopped) things are much different. The total cases in Lazio (that includes Roma and has 6 million inhabitants) is about equal to one week's new cases in Lombardia (which includes Milano and has 10 million).
Where things have really fallen apart for older people, here and apparently in the U.S. as well, is that old people living in "old-age homes" are being woefully neglected - for example, the homes are not calling the emergency health service, people are not being taken to hospital, and in the largest such facility in Italy staff was not wearing any PPE at all. In New Jersey, a large fraction of the residents of one home cited repeatedly this year and in past years for various serious lapses including in infection containment, have died, and in another privately owned and run residence (I don't recall where) the staff simply disappeared after the first case appeared and residents were left starving and in urine-soaked beds - even then, the owners didn't call the authorities and the dead and dying were discovered by chance. Nursing homes in Italy are "socialized", in the U.S. they are "private", but there doesn't seem to be much difference in how awful they are.