During the 1st surge, I talked w my doctor on the phone & asked how he was. He opened up & said it was awful & being w out PPE was horrifying. Doing shifts in the ER, reassuring others that every day was one day closer to it being over. Now, 1 in 5 health care workers have quit.
I remember getting off the phone and crying. I like my doctor. I was afraid for him. And for my sister, who is a nurse. I just kept thinking, "There is no forgiveness for this." I still think that, but not enough people are turning their attention to the system.
Some people are too busy raging against randoms in hospital beds for buying into conspiracy theories to challenge the system that structured this entire experience (the system appreciates this btw).
I hope we shake loose of that shit. It's not about who you have a right to be angry at. You have a right to be angry at a lot of people. It's about what tf you want to make happen. Being mindful of that sharpens your targeting.
Our health care system was awful when this began. Now it's in tatters. People are being told to just accept catching an illness that could lead to long term health care needs. I don't hear the right demands being echoed enough.
Anyway, I was thinking about that call with my doctor this morning. I was thinking about what I imagined we owed to those doctors and nurses, back then, during the height of it, how people were literally applauding for them, and what's happened since. Abandonment & moral injury.
They never needed our applause or tears. They are workers who need our solidarity & a transformed working environment. (Those who haven't already left, that is.) We are patients who need a transformed experience of care. They should never be short staffed and care should be free.
Someone commented suggesting my story was not true bc my family doctor would not be qualified to work in an ER. Imagine the ignorant bliss of thinking that would have been a consideration in the days of refrigerated morgue trucks. He was qualified, but plenty of people were not.
And they knew they weren't qualified. Some of them had not practiced outside their specialty or even engaged in patient care IN YEARS. They were terrified. But they did their best bc death was all around them and health care workers had no PPE and were getting sick CONSTANTLY.
Of course they're quitting in droves. People have no respect for what these people have gone through trying to heal the sick during a damn plague in a country that's rich as fuck, but starves its health care system. Where some people meet care with contempt. They are owed more.
As I mentioned, my sister is a nurse. She's not supposed to be in patient care anymore, but she still cycles in bc too many people at her facility keep getting sick. This week, a coworker said they hadn't quit yet bc she hadn't quit yet, and she felt guilty. She. Felt. Guilty.
What my sister, my doctor, and all of these exhausted, morally injured health care workers are experiencing is a form of collapse btw.
https://twitter.com/MsKellyMHayes/status/1445053941348196360
This is an era of escalating mass sacrifice for the sake of capital. We cannot resign ourselves to experiencing collapse on these terms.
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