NPR

New Evidence Suggests COVID-19 Patients On Ventilators Usually Survive

Early reports found death rates as high as 90% among COVID-19 patients on ventilators. But some hospitals are now reporting mortality lower than 30%.
A nurse at the Veterans Affairs Medical Center in Manhattan holds a cellphone last month so a COVID-19 patient can see and listen to his family.

COVID-19 has given ventilators an undeservedly bad reputation, says Dr. Colin Cooke, an associate professor of medicine in the division of pulmonary and critical care at the University of Michigan.

"It's always disheartening to know that some people are out there saying if you end up on a ventilator it's a death sentence, which is not what we are experiencing — and I don't think it's what the data are showing," Cooke says.

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