Most of the focus on human ingenuity since the outbreak of COVID-19 has been on those scientists and medical researchers who are working feverishly on drugs to treat the disease and vaccines to prevent it. There is also huge interest in the race to develop reliable medical tests that can be mass-produced and administered so as to determine who has been unknowingly infected with the novel coronavirus and acquired at least some immunity and those who have not been exposed and thus remain at risk.
But a story this past week out of Jackson’s University of Mississippi Medical Center over a recent low-tech development could be just as important in the short term for dealing with this disease.
There, a pediatric anesthesiologist with an inventor’s aptitude, put his brain to figuring out a solution for a feared shortage of ventilators — the mechanical device that can be critical in keeping people alive when they are having respiratory failure, as happens with severe cases of COVID-19.
Using items that can be purchased at a hardware store — a garden hose, a lamp timer and an electronic valve — Dr. Charles Robertson has invented a ventilator that costs less than $100 in materials, takes less than a half-hour to assemble and works well in pumping oxygen and air into an infected person’s lungs.
As of Tuesday, UMMC had put together 170 of these Robertson Ventilators, thus doubling the medical center’s current supply of ventilators.
UMMC has asked the Food and Drug Administration for permission to use the Robertson Ventilators in the case of an emergency — that is, when it has run out of commercially produced ventilators.
If the invention is as good as advertised, this could be a tremendous lifesaver, not just in Mississippi but anywhere in the world where hospitals have more critically ill patients to treat then they have ventilators to employ. It could eliminate the gut-wrenching decision that doctors fear over having to decide who lives and who dies when ventilators have to be rationed.
Robertson’s invention might not rank up there with a possible cure for COVID-19, but still it’s a neat and encouraging story. It demonstrates that no matter the problem, there are smart people who will figure out a solution. Some solutions may take more time than others to discover, but eventually someone’s brain will figure it out.
