If it was a case of just seeing if they need oxygen then it'd be trivial.

The issue is when they deteriorate, what do you do then. There are hundreds of ways for people in hospital to "go wrong" knowing when where and how to intervene requires both nurses and doctors. All of which take 3-9 years to train

Besides close monitoring of people on O2 to adjust amounts and intubate if that time comes, there are potentially other components of supportive care that might alter outcomes, like IV anti-virals (e.g. remdesivir) or anti-coagulants, e.g. heparin. Some anti-coagulants can be given at home, but the strong doses being discussed also come with high risk of bleeding, benefitting from bed rest and close observation. For a good slice of the sickest COVID patients, hospitalization is helpful and hard to replicate at home, even with our limited therapies.

That said, oxygen and heparin at home could be good for a lot of patients. Improvements in prognostication may help distinguish that group in the future.

Remdesivir seems promising, also variolation, also plasma therapy (IVIG).

Currently the lockdown makes sense for one reason, to get something that at least makes it seasonal flu-deadly (about 5-10 times less than currently).

Accidental release of data for remdesivir showed no benefit.

https://www.statnews.com/2020/04/23/data-on-gileads-remdesiv...

Maybe the data wasn't ready for release, and the final version will show some benefit, but it's likely that remdesivir has little benefit.

(Genuinely confused about why this got downvotes.)

Thanks! Too bad :/ Last week it seemed promising...

(I have no idea who would downvote your comment.)

People don’t like bad news.

Remdesivir seems far less promising now, unfortunately:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-52406261