“I got ten calls. All of whom, young people, who otherwise would be excellent candidates to be able to put on ECMO. They’re so sick that if they don’t get… that support, they are probably going to die. I have three beds.” That’s what Dr. Jeffrey Dellavolpe of San Antonio Methodist Hospital in Texas told CNN this weekend, adding: “Making that decision… I don’t think a lot of us are prepared.”

Dellavolpe was talking about ECMO, or extracorporeal membrane oxygenation, an expensive and labor-intensive treatment that’s not right for everybody. But as his statement makes clear, in a state where the Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick famously suggested that grandparents would be willing to die for the sake of the economy, when life-or-death decisions are being made, younger, healthier people are already being given priority.

On one hand, that makes sense for those who base their decisions on “actuarial tables.” On the other, given all we know about COVID-19, it’s a new way of rewarding bad behavior. As author Amanda Filipacchi wrote on Twitter, “it’s likely the young people were the ones partying, flouting the mask wearing.”

https://twitter.com/AFilipacchi/status/1280101344079220739

We can’t say we didn’t see this coming. We already had reports from Italy in March of medical professionals “weeping in the hospital hallways because of the choices they are going to have to make.”

The headline of the Boston Globe op-ed where that quote appeared reads: “A coronavirus cautionary tale from Italy: Don’t do what we did.

>Sarah Palin once said Death Panels would be “downright evil.” Trump made them a reality.

When Sarah Palin warned that Obamacare would create a future in which bureaucrats rationed America’s socialist healthcare—sitting on what she called “Death Panels”—Politifact called it the 2009 “Lie of the Year.”

In 2020, Trump Death Panels are a frightening new reality.

Especially for the disabled.

https://thedailyedge.substack.com/p/the-trump-death-panels