The sad thing is that hospitalizing children for malnutrition almost doesn't make sense, sadly. What is the hospital going to do? Feed them? Feed them the exact ratio of nutrition that infants need? So basically the hospitals are at best making formula on the fly, or worst, just using formula they bought. So it uses up either more or equal resources. If the problem is that we don't have the resources to feed infants how does that help?

The point is that you can't just make up for the gap in formula with more hospitalizations. It's not converting a bad situation into a compromise for a less than ideal situation. It remains an equally bad no matter how many kids you admit. If the hospitals attempt to help kids, they buy formula at their higher willingness to pay price (backed by insurance), and so some other kid doesn't get it, and therefore must be hospitalized.

Basically markets are not optional and fucking ours up was a really really bad idea. Some may say, "but this wasn't a result of the covid response market fuck up." Yes it was. Abbot had their plant shut down. Their competitor has expanded to double their production, but it isn't enough. If they and abbot had access to more labor resources and more material resources, which are in short supply at every part of the economy, and didn't have talent drain like the whole market is experiencing, they could have moved well beyond doubling their production, and abbot could have sprint built other resources. If Europe's markets weren't in a similar state they could have ramped up production and shared a lot more than they currently are, but they are also facing resource, labor, and talent scarcity.