Presumably not everyone needs a hospital bed. Most are fine to take a few days of bed rest, many who would normally be hospitalized out of caution can be cared for by family at home with teledoc guidance, it's a small percentage at high risk who need hospital care.
Yes ... it used the current percentage of those who get it and require hospital stays and those who need the IC along with the average number of days that they stay. Unfortunately, 70% of our capacity was full before the Coronavirus arrived so there's simply not that much capacity.
a small percentage of a large number is still a large number. 80% infected within 1 year and ~10% of those require hospitalization.
usa: 350m => 80% is 280M => ~30 million hospital/ICU beds for 2-4 weeks.
this is on top of regular/ongoing hospitalisation. hence it hitting any african country or india with the same force would be devastating.
