New figures suggest the Saskatchewan Health Authority (SHA) has secured some additional ventilators but still has hundreds more on order to treat people in a potential surge of serious COVID-19 cases.
In critical cases, COVID-19 attacks the lungs and restricts breathing to the point where a patient needs a ventilator to stay alive.
Early last week, the health authority said it had 91 adult intensive care ventilators, 80 subacute ventilators and dozens of ventilators inside operating rooms across the province.
In an update Wednesday, the health authority revised that figure as of March 25, saying it had 332 invasive ventilators (including ventilators used in critical care, sub-acute and anaesthetic environments) and 118 non-invasive ventilators.
Another 1,383 ventilators are on order — 862 invasive, 521 non-invasive — at a time when Canada, like most other countries, has a limited supply.
In an early-draft worst-case-scenario planning document that leaked last week and is being revised, the health authority said that Saskatoon alone, at the peak of the pandemic, might need as many as 500 to 600 invasive and non-invasive ventilators — daily.
Who gets a ventilator?
Faced with spikes in critical cases, physicians in Italy, which has been very hard hit by the virus, have faced the reality of having to make life-and-death decisions about who gets a ventilator and who doesn't.
Health units around the world have had to consider various potential factors to decide that, including a patient's age, their chances of survival and even a random lottery.
While the Saskatchewan Health Authority's early-planning doc hinted at an "ethical framework for decision-making", no details were provided.
"These guides are based on principles that...ensure that decisions are not unpredictable or arbitrary, and that values are applied consistently to patients needing care," according to a statement provided this week.
On Wednesday, Scott Livingstone, the health authority's CEO, said the public's communal effort to flatten the virus' curve will lessen the chances of the health system becoming overburdened.
"It may not reduce, in fact, the overall number of cases, it just is going to spread them out over a longer period of time," Livingstone said.
Not rationing PPE for health workers
At the same news conference Wednesday, Dr. Susan Shaw, the health's authority's chief medical officer, was asked if personal protective equipment (PPE) for front-line health care workers (such as masks, gowns and gloves) is being rationed.
"No, we're not," Shaw said. "We're taking a lot of steps to make sure we understand what is the best use of our personal protective equipment, where it's most appropriately stocked, and how do we ensure that we continue to have the right amount of equipment to ensure our staff are safe."
Last week, Livingstone accused a small number of health care workers of stealing some pandemic supplies.
"There's lots of fear out there, there's fear in the public, there's fear of course in our health care workers. But if that PPE isn't available when people need it to properly care for COVID-19 patients, they're putting people's lives at risk," he said.
Barbara Cape, the president of the union local representing 11,000 health care workers in the province, said she too was concerned.
"If those supplies go missing, it is my members who are without supplies, who need them the most," Cape said.
