Conakry, Guinea - Soaring demand for oxygen prompted by the coronavirus is bringing out a stark global truth: Even the right to breathe depends on money.
“Oxygen is one of the most important interventions, it’s in very short supply,” said Dr. Tom Frieden, former director of the CDC and current president and CEO of Resolve to Save Lives. Alassane Ly, a telecommunications engineer and US resident who split his time between the Atlanta suburbs and his homeland, boarded a flight to Guinea in February. He promised his wife and young daughters he’d be home by April to celebrate Ramadan.
It was apparently too little and too late. Within hours, he was dead. Six weeks later, his coronavirus test came back positive. Conté, who was diagnosed with coronavirus and hospitalized briefly at Donka himself, was philosophical about the gap between wealthy nations and those like Guinea.Patients lie in beds at a temporary field hospital in the Ifema convention centre in Madrid, Spain. As coronavirus deaths climbed, engineers laid 7 kilometres of tubing in less than a week to give 1 500 beds in the impromptu facility a direct supply of pure oxygen.
The issue got more attention after British Prime Minister Boris Johnson narrowly survived coronavirus, crediting his recovery to the National Health Service and “liters and liters of oxygen.” But Johnson is a prominent figure in one of the world’s wealthiest countries. Everywhere that oxygen is scarce, pulse oximeters to measure blood-oxygen levels are even scarcer. By the time lips turn blue, a frequent measure used, a patient is usually beyond saving.
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