As a system designer, everything in my view is a system. Whether it is a society or org culture or human body or a family or a product or a service, whatever it is, it can be viewed from the lens of a system.
On a high level, a system can be defined as a set of things working together following certain principles, policies, procedures, routines that connect effectively to make a whole. In short we have a number of parts that come together as a whole to get the work done. Every part has its own system in place.
We all know the famous parable around blind men and the elephant. When each blind man declared a part as something (a snake, rug, rope, column etc) each one of them was wrong because the whole was something else. However in their experience, they only felt their part and expressed what it felt like to them. In real life we also tend to look at things in parts rather than experiencing the world as a whole. Many times we end up wrong as we miss the big picture.
The way we look at the pandemic, the economy, global warming, poverty, waste management etc is all in parts. This is not at all surprising because we are taught to look at one aspect in a detailed manner from our school days. We never learnt something as a whole. There was a language class, a music class, a math class, a science class etc. We never got to look at the world as a whole. The world is a lot more complex than what we know because it consists of a number of systems and sub systems connected together. We need to look at the big picture and the small picture in detail to understand the complexity, the chaos, intricacies and interconnections.
Systems Thinking allows us to understand any complex phenomenon out there. In my profession as a designer, systems thinking allows me to be domain agnostic. It gives a new pair of eyes to look into any phenomenon or process or procedure or routine or a perspective in an unbiased manner.
Now that we are amidst a pandemic, let us look at it from a systems view point. Using systems thinking how do we understand this pandemic?
The most magnificent system out there is our human body. If you look closely there are about 11 systems that make this body work. Within each system there are several sub systems that work in tandem to ensure the body runs smoothly like shown.
A novel zoonotic coronavirus, SARS-CoV-2 has resulted in a pandemic of respiratory infection.
When the virus (Sars-Cov-2) attacks the human body, it attacks the immune system like any flu does. If the immunity is stronger, the antibodies fight back the virus. If the immunity is weaker, the body gets affected. In this case lungs are affected with an infection (pneumonia). The majority of people who contract Covid-19 suffer only mild, cold-like symptoms. WHO says about 80% of people with Covid-19 recover without needing any specialist treatment. Only about one person in six becomes seriously ill “and develops difficulty breathing”.
So how can Covid-19 develop into a more serious illness featuring pneumonia, and what does that do to our lungs and the rest of our body?
When people with Covid-19 develop a cough and fever, the infection reaches the respiratory tree – the air passages that conduct air between the lungs and the outside. The lining of the respiratory tree gets inflamed. This causes irritation to the nerve lining of the airway. It makes coughing difficult and every speck of dust causes cough.
I can write this from my experience of seeing my mother in law suffer COPD for years together. With the infection, the blood gas exchange gets compromised which are at the end of air passages. The air sacs aka alveoli at the bottom of the lungs has the inflammatory material and this is how we end up with pneumonia . They perform a test called ABG (Arterial Blood Gas Exchange) and they look for the oxygen and C02 levels along with the pH values. When the C02 level is very high, the person gets unconscious and forgets to breathe and actively keep up the oxygen. When lungs become filled with inflammatory material we are unable to get enough oxygen to the bloodstream, reducing the body’s ability to take on oxygen and get rid of carbon dioxide. Once oxygen is compromised in the system it ends up with multiple organ failure finally causing death.
This is where your BIPAPs, Oxygen cylinders and ventilators are needed.
Isn't pneumonia treatable?
Yes it is treatable. Doctors help the patients by ventilating them and maintain high oxygen levels until their lungs are able to function in a normal way again as they recover. This where Health care system comes into picture.
If we have only 20 ICU beds and ventilators and if we have 40 patients, it overwhelms the system. Imagine this with 200 patients and 20 ICU beds. So it is not the pneumonia which will kill people but inability to treat pneumonia on a right time will kill people. This is a healthcare system failure that allowed organ failure to happen.
OK, Can't we increase the ventilators and Oxygen supply?
Yes, we can. Provided all the factories are working and producing the same output as before. In fact we need much higher output now to handle the demand and surge.
Because Covid is human to human transmission, we have adopted lockdown and physical distancing as a measure to reduce the number of cases at a time. This affects the production of PPEs and medical equipments. With not much human workers in the factory and surge in patients at the same time, it causes stress on the system.
So what are governments doing in this situation?
To keep up the society in order, governments are trying to pump in stimulus funds and free testing to keep things moving. They are trying their best by enforcing strict quarantine measures to avoid the spread of infection. The governments are doing their bit to control the death rate, infection rate and a social crisis, all at the same time.
Like above, we can go on and on and uncover all the systems and the effect of pandemic on the systems. The various parts that make up a larger whole called LIFE can be understood in much deeper sense. Starting from the respiratory system of the human body, all the way to economy cycle everything is a system and by deep diving into each aspect we will be able to appreciate the intricacies and interconnections of the system. Now do you get a sense of how to look at the virus in a systemic view?
P.S: I teach system design a full module for product designers and product managers as an eight week course. The moment you understand how to look at the system deeply, your ability to thrive in ambiguity enhances multifold. As i adding case lets to my course material, I am sharing some thoughts and snippets here!
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