Spaces of Isolation – Bridges between home and health care [M1]
Modular units are an emerging and strategic development in triage within public health systems. The new reality brought about by the current pandemic exposed weak points in hospitals and other health care facilities – as well as highlighted the need for constant change and adaptability. The latest studies have indicated significant correlations between novel viruses and humanity's careless attitude toward nature, which is primarily manifested in deforestation and other means of land conversion. Such practices are driving exotic species out of their evolutionary niches and into man-made environment, where they interact and breed new strains of disease. Moreover, climate change poses a real and serious threat regarding the spread of future pandemics. Changing weather conditions and rising temperatures are exacerbating the already dire situation with the thawing permafrost soils, which have been increasingly releasing viruses and bacteria we as a species have not encountered for centuries.
During the seven-week course, we will carefully examine as many possibilities for the development of future isolation schemes as possible. The current pandemic has opened a broader discussion of the need to establish a working system of temporary isolation units for patients who do not need to be admitted to intensive care units. Home isolation is a valuable and valid alternative to a hospital setting, requires behavioral change, but no additional investment in infrastructure. The downside is that patients often find home isolation psychologically taxing, not least because of their awareness of putting their loved ones at risk of contracting the disease. We plan to address this issue by proposing modular units of several different scales, applicable to different housing models (nursing homes, apartment buildings, town houses, etc.). The principal feature of proposed isolation units is quick assembly and transportation between locations. Health care providers all over the world have repeatedly lamented the lack of effective communication and poor economic use of equipment. This situation requires novel micro-scale systems of help that could potentially ensure a higher quality of handling the pandemic in terms of the global community.
IMAGE: Haus-Rucker-Co, Günter Zamp Kelp, Laurids Ortner, Manfred Ortner, Klaus Pinter, Oasis no. 7, 1972
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