a bed you wouldn't want to wake up in...

May 30, 2003 7:43 PM

isolation stretcher:staff at a japanese medical system support company demonstrate the company's 'isolation stretcher': "The highly protective stretcher, which costs 5.2 million yen (a half million dollars?), has been in demand since the spread of SARS" ...a 'bed' you wouldn't want to wake up in.
posted by n o i s e s (5 comments total)

i'm sorry, i've no time to google up this post: i've got to go to work (& there's a typhoon working it's way through japan this a.m. too), but i hope this makes for an interesting thread.
posted by n o i s e s at 7:48 PM on May 30, 2003

5200000 JAPANESE YEN (JPY) = 43580.2883 US DOLLAR (USD)

[bloomberg currency calc]
posted by Zebulun at 8:07 PM on May 30, 2003

I had a feeling there must have been an extra zero that crept into that conversion. People aren't quite THAT crazy over SARS to start buying super-stretchers at a million bucks a pair.
posted by Wingy at 8:50 PM on May 30, 2003

I don't see the place for this expensive gadget. All SARS patients should be in respiratory isolation, preferably in a negative pressure room. If you have to transfer one somewhere else, put an N95 mask on the patient until he gets where he's going. Disposable N95 masks retail for about US$1, and surely much less in the large quantities that hospitals buy.

SARS is a remarkably difficult little bug. Canada just had another rash of cases, after they thought they had it licked.

It's not cool to eat civet cats, kids.
posted by Slithy_Tove at 6:46 AM on May 31, 2003

but kopi luwak is still ok, right?

RIGHT?
posted by donpardo at 7:20 AM on May 31, 2003