To make it more concrete: the lack of hospital capacity is one of the major reasons why COVID lockdowns lasted for so long after vaccines were available. Hospital capacity numbers were what politicians and bureaucrats were watching to determine when and how to ease lockdowns. If we had more excess hospital capacity, the lockdowns would have ended sooner.

When hospitals routinely operate at 120% and a major crisis doubles what we ask of them, people don't get the treatment they need.

I'm sure most of us have stories of friends or relations who needed hospital care during COVID and received less care than they normally would have received outside of the crisis.