The shortage of hospital beds for COVID-19 and non-COVID-19 patients during the lockdown of Wuhan, China.

BACKGROUND

The 76-day lockdown of Wuhan city has successfully contained the first wave of the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) outbreak. However, to date few studies have evaluated the hospital bed shortage for COVID-19 during the lockdown and none for non-COVID-19 patients, although such data are important for better preparedness of the future outbreak.

METHODS

We built a compartmental model to estimate the daily numbers of hospital bed shortage for patients with mild, severe and critical COVID-19, taking account of underreport and diagnosis delay.

RESULTS

The maximal daily shortage of inpatient beds for mild, severe and critical COVID-19 patients was 43,960 (95% confidence interval: 35,246, 52,929), 2,779 (1,395, 4,163) and 196 (143, 250) beds in early February 2020. An earlier or later lockdown would have greatly increased the shortage of hospital beds in Wuhan. The overwhelmed healthcare system might have delayed the provision of health care to both COVID-19 and non-COVID-19 patients during the lockdown. The second wave in Wuhan could have occurred in June 2020 if social distancing measures had waned in early March 2020. The hospital bed shortage was estimated much smaller in the potential second wave than in the first one.

CONCLUSIONS

Our findings suggest that the timing and strength of lockdown is important for the containment of the COVID-19 outbreaks. The healthcare needs of non-COVID-19 patients in the pandemic warrant more investigations.