Coronavirus prep

1404405407409410747

Replies

  • SModa61
    SModa61 Posts: 2,828 Member
    I wish there were more acknowledgement of diseases and conditions that have a far higher risk factor of death during this pandemic. My 94 year old grandmother died alone in a nursing home in the middle of this, not having been able to see her family for 6 weeks. We saw her through the window and talked in the phone, but she was always a very touchy feely person and even before the pandemic felt the lack of touch even we frequently visited her. Remember, infants can actually die from lack of touch. It affects adults profoundly too. She died in her sleep not from COVID, having largely lost the will to live, while being so isolated with no end in sight.
    My father has advanced Alzheimer’s and truly suffered from the initial isolation. He couldn’t understand why we all abandoned him in his eyes, refused to hug him and wore masks, which terrify him. Finally my mother put her foot down and said she wasn’t going to waste the little time he has left, making him feel scared and abandoned. How horrible we would feel if that’s the way his life ended in fear and loneliness.
    What about special needs kids who aren’t getting the therapy they so desperately need in person? Each year is critical for them, having lost it, they can’t regain ground and will suffer for a long time because of this.
    There’s also a risk in driving yet people choose to take that risk every day.
    I wish there were more acknowledgement of the nuances of this situation. Full disclosure, my brother in law is a hospital physician who works every day with COVID patients in two different hospitals. He is really annoyed at how people are freaking out so much about COVID while ignoring how much people are affected who suffer from other diseases that are barely acknowledged.
    There’s a lot of politics involved.

    I think this is a side that is not talked about enough. Thank you!
  • stevehenderson776
    stevehenderson776 Posts: 324 Member
    Yes, it is. There are also many people dying because they aren’t able to get the care they need for their chronic diseases because of hospitals closing because of stopping non emergency procedures. It does make me angry when people say it’s all worth it, if it saves one life...one life from COVID that is. Do all the other lives lost from canceled cancer screenings, inability to book needed scheduled procedures, suicides, overdosing from depression and anxiety due to isolation and inability to get to mental health groups just not count them? Why not? Are their lives not as important just because they don’t have the ‘in’ disease?
    The thing is in medicine, there’s almost always side effects. But somehow, that doesn’t seem to apply because it’s been overtaken by politics, which doesn’t like nuances. It’s called the art of medicine precisely because there are nuances! People die when we ignore that.

    Yeah. Surgery cancellations and suspensions have been an issue here. Wait times were already on the ridiculous side for certain procedures and now they're getting outrageous. Grandma needs a new knee so she won't have to live every waking moment in pain? Tough titties. Try again in a year or two. Here's a morphine addiction to tide her over.
    Hell, even routine lab work is backed up a mile.
  • kimny72
    kimny72 Posts: 16,023 Member
    Yes, it is. There are also many people dying because they aren’t able to get the care they need for their chronic diseases because of hospitals closing because of stopping non emergency procedures. It does make me angry when people say it’s all worth it, if it saves one life...one life from COVID that is. Do all the other lives lost from canceled cancer screenings, inability to book needed scheduled procedures, suicides, overdosing from depression and anxiety due to isolation and inability to get to mental health groups just not count them? Why not? Are their lives not as important just because they don’t have the ‘in’ disease?
    The thing is in medicine, there’s almost always side effects. But somehow, that doesn’t seem to apply because it’s been overtaken by politics, which doesn’t like nuances. It’s called the art of medicine precisely because there are nuances! People die when we ignore that.

    Yeah. Surgery cancellations and suspensions have been an issue here. Wait times were already on the ridiculous side for certain procedures and now they're getting outrageous. Grandma needs a new knee so she won't have to live every waking moment in pain? Tough titties. Try again in a year or two. Here's a morphine addiction to tide her over.
    Hell, even routine lab work is backed up a mile.

    This sort of thing must be very localized, because I've heard about problems like that online, but I know people in a NYC suburb, OH, and WA who are getting medical procedures as per usual, and here in VA routine appts, screenings, surgeries etc with no issue. I guess it depends how developed and we'll staffed the healthcare industry in your area is.

    Now that I think about it, all of the areas i mentioned are in close proximity to universities and university hospitals. I'd bet that factors in.
  • stevehenderson776
    stevehenderson776 Posts: 324 Member
    kimny72 wrote: »
    Yes, it is. There are also many people dying because they aren’t able to get the care they need for their chronic diseases because of hospitals closing because of stopping non emergency procedures. It does make me angry when people say it’s all worth it, if it saves one life...one life from COVID that is. Do all the other lives lost from canceled cancer screenings, inability to book needed scheduled procedures, suicides, overdosing from depression and anxiety due to isolation and inability to get to mental health groups just not count them? Why not? Are their lives not as important just because they don’t have the ‘in’ disease?
    The thing is in medicine, there’s almost always side effects. But somehow, that doesn’t seem to apply because it’s been overtaken by politics, which doesn’t like nuances. It’s called the art of medicine precisely because there are nuances! People die when we ignore that.

    Yeah. Surgery cancellations and suspensions have been an issue here. Wait times were already on the ridiculous side for certain procedures and now they're getting outrageous. Grandma needs a new knee so she won't have to live every waking moment in pain? Tough titties. Try again in a year or two. Here's a morphine addiction to tide her over.
    Hell, even routine lab work is backed up a mile.

    This sort of thing must be very localized, because I've heard about problems like that online, but I know people in a NYC suburb, OH, and WA who are getting medical procedures as per usual, and here in VA routine appts, screenings, surgeries etc with no issue. I guess it depends how developed and we'll staffed the healthcare industry in your area is.

    Now that I think about it, all of the areas i mentioned are in close proximity to universities and university hospitals. I'd bet that factors in.

    Ontario's health system has been a mess for years and years. The covid has just opened the cracks further.
  • kimny72
    kimny72 Posts: 16,023 Member
    kimny72 wrote: »
    Yes, it is. There are also many people dying because they aren’t able to get the care they need for their chronic diseases because of hospitals closing because of stopping non emergency procedures. It does make me angry when people say it’s all worth it, if it saves one life...one life from COVID that is. Do all the other lives lost from canceled cancer screenings, inability to book needed scheduled procedures, suicides, overdosing from depression and anxiety due to isolation and inability to get to mental health groups just not count them? Why not? Are their lives not as important just because they don’t have the ‘in’ disease?
    The thing is in medicine, there’s almost always side effects. But somehow, that doesn’t seem to apply because it’s been overtaken by politics, which doesn’t like nuances. It’s called the art of medicine precisely because there are nuances! People die when we ignore that.

    Yeah. Surgery cancellations and suspensions have been an issue here. Wait times were already on the ridiculous side for certain procedures and now they're getting outrageous. Grandma needs a new knee so she won't have to live every waking moment in pain? Tough titties. Try again in a year or two. Here's a morphine addiction to tide her over.
    Hell, even routine lab work is backed up a mile.

    This sort of thing must be very localized, because I've heard about problems like that online, but I know people in a NYC suburb, OH, and WA who are getting medical procedures as per usual, and here in VA routine appts, screenings, surgeries etc with no issue. I guess it depends how developed and we'll staffed the healthcare industry in your area is.

    Now that I think about it, all of the areas i mentioned are in close proximity to universities and university hospitals. I'd bet that factors in.

    Ontario's health system has been a mess for years and years. The covid has just opened the cracks further.

    Crap, sorry. This pandemic certainly does seem to be magnifying the cracks (and giant craters) that were already there.
  • kushiel1
    kushiel1 Posts: 95 Member
    edited October 2020
    Some of the issue was that if you already had a cancer diagnosis you could continue treatment, but if you didn't...you were often deferred because "elective" procedures (such as diagnostics) were not being done. Or you couldn't get in to see that specialist because of Covid restrictions.

    The restrictions even now on visitation in hospitals (because of course it makes sense for a sick person to be alone for 20 hours of the day....) are ridiculous. Or if you are in the ED you can't have anyone with you.

    In general I agree with the poster above who pointed out that not only health screenings are being put off but the incidents of abuse, suicidal ideation, depression, anxiety, etc are all on the rise. I read a statistic recently that said that the US is up 300,000 deaths from where they thought we'd be (I could be wrong in my remembering honestly) if 200k of those are covid the other 100k is covid related in some form probably - why aren't we freaking out about that number?

    Covid fear is killing more people (or at least harming them in irrevocable ways) than Covid itself is. The cure for the disease can NOT be worse than the disease itself and we are heading that way at this point though I fear we are already there.