The answer to the most important question is at the end of the article. They demonstrated that this is safe, not that it’s effective.
> “This is the first human data and the results are limited solely to demonstrating the safety of the procedure and not its effectiveness,” said co-author Takanori Takebe of Cincinnati Children’s Hospital and the University of Osaka in Japan. “But now that we have established tolerance, the next step will be to evaluate how effective the process is for delivering oxygen to the bloodstream.”
If it’s proven to be effective and can help avoid ventilators for (at least some) people, it would be a huge breakthrough and improvement in the quality of life for the patient and for their close ones.
It would be interesting to see how long it takes for this measure to make it into Advanced Directive worksheets/forms. I'd also wager that this method will be unilaterally declined by men who also decline suppositories on account of perceived homosexuality. Imagine dying because you think the life-saving practice is "gay".
> “This is the first human data and the results are limited solely to demonstrating the safety of the procedure and not its effectiveness,” said co-author Takanori Takebe of Cincinnati Children’s Hospital and the University of Osaka in Japan. “But now that we have established tolerance, the next step will be to evaluate how effective the process is for delivering oxygen to the bloodstream.”
If it’s proven to be effective and can help avoid ventilators for (at least some) people, it would be a huge breakthrough and improvement in the quality of life for the patient and for their close ones.