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I'm a Health Care Worker. You Need to Know How Close We Are to Breaking.
Now its hospital staff in Arizona who are being challenged by the coronavirus, and that didnt have to be.As I write this, I have just finished my ninth consecutive overnight shift as an emergency medicine physician here. At the end of each shift I go to an Airbnb, where I have been living alone for two and a half months, away from my wife and 10-year-old daughter so that I am less likely to pass the coronavirus on to them.
In a medical crisis, my job is to manage a clinical team, problem-solve and be in control. It is hard to admit that I feel vulnerable and scared when I think of the Covid-19 surge we are facing now and the combined Covid-19 and influenza tsunami expected later this year. But I am admitting it because you need to know how close health care workers are to breaking.
My colleagues and I watched what happened this spring in New York with horror and hoped we could avoid the same from happening in our state. But our federal and state governments abandoned their duty and let the virus terrorize our vulnerable communities, spreading rampantly. Now we are beginning to experience what hospitals in the Northeast went through months ago.
When Arizona and other states started to open back up in May, public health experts predicted a surge of Covid-19 cases. That surge is just beginning. We see a steady increase in patients arriving at the emergency department with Covid-19 symptoms. Every day Arizona sets a record high for daily cases. As of today, over twice as many Arizonans are hospitalized for Covid-19 symptoms as were on June 1.
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/06/26/opinion/coronavirus-arizona-hospitals.html
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I'm a Health Care Worker. You Need to Know How Close We Are to Breaking. (Original Post)
Zorro
Jun 2020
OP
TreasonousBastard
(43,049 posts)1. Well, I got yer MAGA hanging. REMEMBER IN NOVEMBER!
stillcool
(32,626 posts)2. Effed up. They shouldn't be in this position.
Not after New York. The lack of everything needed is horrible. It's like the country is falling in on us.
Squinch
(50,773 posts)3. Feels like Deja Vu. Sadly it's not. This did not have to happen.
marybourg
(12,540 posts)4. And we don't have a Gov. Cuomo to
strategize our way out of this. What a shambles.
appalachiablue
(41,052 posts)5. Tragic, how long will this SURGE last esp. in FL, TX, CA?