I am deeply offended by three things covered on the national news today. First, Vice President Pence was shown in Mayo Clinic completely and totally unmasked. All others were masked up. And he wasn't practicing the social distancing thing of six feet apart. The implications for this error on his part are astounding, too much for one blog post. Yes, that was nuts, and you can bet that it'll get some air time. Second, the President has issued an Executive Order demanding that the meat industry remain open. While I do not know what that means in terms of where who remains open, I do know that there are muliple reports of Tyson's or Smithfields closing down because way too many people are infected.
Three, and this hits closer to home, is that the governor of the State of Texas has issued various orders ending the shelter in place decision and beginning the process of opening up Texas for business. All of these things are happening here despite warning from CDC, folks at the University of Washington, and who knows where else, that doing so this soon invites more infected persons and a resulting spike in infections and deaths.
Did the death of the ER physician, Dr. Lorna Breen, hit you? For some reason, it caught me off guard. A highly respected physician, seeing mulitple patients on many days, experiencing too many deaths of too many of these patients. Did she sign up for this, the relentless day in and day out struggle to keep people alive? See her story here. And here. And here. We know the edges of the story: overworked physician, contracted COVID-19, off work for a week and a half, hospitalized for exhaustion, went home to Virginia, died by suicide. She must have lost hope. Perhaps she did not see a way out of her own pain at the pain of others. You and I don't really know, but those closest to her know.
While many people are clamoring for opening up states and counties and cities and towns, people on the front lines are exhausted. Certainly the economy is important. There are distressed people left and right. Not enough work, not enough money coming in, not enough food on the table. I get it that people need to return to work.
While we work in that direction. I recommend that we make haste slowly. I recommend that we listen to the doctors and not the pundits and the politicians who have their agendas.
The earth is depending upon them.
On the brighter side of things, sheltering in place with someone I love, who has my interests at heart, who understands that as a two-time cancer survivor I am greatly at risk. You probably know a lot of us. We are everywhere though we may not have a blog or a FB page or even the words to tell the stories of how we feel.
So, if my town opens up too early, I won't be there. If my church opens up too early, I won't be there. If friends have dinner parties and invite us, I won't be there.
Switch the "I" for a "we" and you'll know how seriously we are taking this thing. For our sake and for the sake of those we love and the community that we love.
Let's all take care of each other so that more physicians do not have to die, nurses do not have to become infected, and the folks in all essential services are taken care of, folks at the pharmacy, the meat packing plants, those who drive the city trucks through our streets, those who deliver our mail, and on and on and on and on.
Flip the "I" into a "we" and the world is a better place.
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