The present passive Trump Administration approach is to largely leave the responsibility to the states.The states must request ventilators from the federal stockpile or buy them on the open market, making them bid against each other for the scarce apparatus, needlessly delaying the process, and driving up prices so they cant buy as many units. No wonder Cuomo and other governors are worried and furious.
Cuomo would create a federally controlled pool, dispatched on a rotating basis to those states experiencing highest demand. As a state passes its peak number of serious cases, it would be compelled to return immediately the no-longer-needed machines to the pool for re-deployment to the cities and states with the next predicted highest demand.
Handling such a complex system, and especially doing it transparently and objectively so all states would feel their needs were handled fairly, would be an administrative nightmare using existing procurement and logistical systems at a time redeployments must be done in near-real-time because lives are at stake.
Fortunately, theres the IoT, which is starting to transform every aspect of the economy and our personal lives. It is applicable to the respirator crisis for two reasons. First, the IoT lets us harvest real-time data on the location and status of things, such as the life-saving ventilators; analyze that data automatically; then share it immediately (sharing is crucial: we dont have the luxury of one group having access to data and then passing it to the next. Data access must be simultaneous!)among everyone needing that data to make better decisions.
The second aspect of the IoT that makes it ideal for the respirator crisis is that one of its key tools, blockchain, guarantees the process is transparent and cant be jiggered to favor any hospital or state, answering concerns about hoarding.
Blockchain is ideal in this case because it is a distributed database (for example, listing all respirators in use, on the way, or in production) that is housed on multiple computers in many locations at the same time. Whats critical for the ventilator crisis is that no single body manages the database everyone in the network has a copy. It can only be altered by consensus of all the users, making it transparent. Anand Sukumaran of ByteAlly, a blockchain consultancy, says this kind of distributed database is easier and faster for a variety of suppliers to share data, versus connecting disparate systems of many suppliers products. The suppliers can protect their proprietary information. A single user cant corrupt a blockchain, and cryptography makes certain every single authorized users copy is synchronized in real time.
Applied to the ventilator distribution issue, every state, every manufacturer, and the FEMA stockpile administrator would have shared access. Real-time data about the current number of cases in every state, those needing ventilators, etc., could also be seamlessly integrated, so supply and demand could be easily visualized and adjusted. All key participants could have a daily Zoom call and discuss the distribution. Every ventilator in use, production or distribution would have a wireless sensor added, so each item and its location could be visualized precisely on a map and rerouted instantly as needed.
I feel like the article is using IoT wrong. Are they specifically trying to talk about the DLT project IOTA?
IoTs can connect to any blockchain, especially with offchain tools like Chainlink to connect blockchains to other sources of data. IOTA isn't exclusive in that field.
