Pandemic Planning after Covid-19

What happens when demand for intensive care exceeds the supply of beds available? Covid-19 has brought these questions to the fore in an exceptionally acute fashion, highlighting the multi-level response required. This chapter, written as the pandemic was developing in the spring of 2020, when the UK and, indeed, most of the world was in lockdown to minimize social interaction, addresses these dilemmas in three sections: (1) the nature and extent of the demand for intensive care and the government’s response to Covid-19 (up until April 2020), (2) the necessity for a procedural framework for decision making to promote transparency, fairness, and consistency, and (3) the models of clinical triage to achieve the best results.