Ventilators are crucial in keeping severely-ill coronavirus patients alive — but hospitals across the country are facing a critical shortage of the life-saving medical device amid the rapidly-spreading and unpredictable pandemic.

A ventilator is a machine that helps people who cannot breathe properly on their own by pumping air in and out of their lungs through a tube inserted into their windpipe.

A ventilator is different from a respirator, which is a protective face mask that stops the wearer from inhaling hazardous airborne particles — such as the N95 respirators that hospital staff need to protect themselves from getting infected by coronavirus patients.

Because COVID-19, the potentially deadly illness caused by the novel coronavirus, affects the respiratory system — causing shortness of breath or trouble breathing in acute cases — a ventilator could mean the difference between life and death for some patients.

Dr. Daniel Griffin, who is the head of infectious disease at ProHEALTH Care, said ventilators can become necessary for severe cases in the second week of battling the virus.

“The first week, people feel crummy — they’ll feel like they have a viral illness,” Griffin told The Post. “But for some people during that second week, they’ll start developing significant difficulties breathing.”

When a person experiences trouble breathing, they will start breathing twice as fast as they normally do — about 28 to 30 times a minute — because their lungs are inflamed and they’re fighting to get oxygen into them, Griffin said.

It’s at this point that a hospital may turn to a ventilator.

“It’s basically like running a marathon and you just don’t get a chance to stop and there’s a part where you can’t keep going,” Griffin explained. “The ventilator is like getting to jump in the car and letting someone else drive.”

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