2/17/20
Global Body
Warning Assorted Writings on Public Health Care, My personal Risk Management
Journey.
I have been following the Novel
Corona Virus since the first inklings of a pneumonia outbreak in China in the
beginning of December 2019. In the last 15 years I have also noticed that many
people in this country don’t know the importance of Public Health practice, how
their bodies work and how diseases spread. I put that responsibility on our education
systems across the United States. But this is not the time to go down that
rabbit hole.
Why was I interested in some
artifact of health news seeping out of China? I love history, and Asian
cultures because they offer so much to the world. I also love and respect
science especially biology. Why? In Junior High School we learned about Public
Health, and gasp, Sex ED or as it was safely called “Reproduction,” disease and
how to prevent or heal when and if possible.
We dissected fetal piglets, looked through microscopes at slides, outlined
phylogenetics in relationship to vertebrates and non- vertebrates. We had to
graph, draw, listen, and read. I went to a public school. To be interested in
how the world continues to work, I keep alert to the places that are known to
produce new viruses. By now we all should know of those places. The convergence
of history in general, disease in specific and my interest in Asian culture and
people kind of all started in my early teens.
Here in New York City we have the
Department of Health which offered a unique two-day training in the nineties
which was taught by Dr. Vincent Coello. The topic was Risk Management and the
example to apply it to centered on Pandemic Influenza. As a result of that FREE
two-day class I learned that it would not be If but When a
pandemic would happen again. This was
the only instance in which I was ahead of Bill Gates!
I find it alarming that people in
this country put Health on the back burner unless they are research scientists
or clinicians who see the results of not caring about health. Then when they
are very sick, expect practitioners to come up with miracle cures. When you are
laid out with 2019-nCoV is NOT the time to correct your
diet. You will be lucky if you will be able to eat. There is no vaccine yet, only
supportive care. Guess what the result
of poor public health practice is? The structures that support the cost of care
fail. The enormity collapses in on itself. It is chaos with cost far beyond
Medicare for all, Universal Health Coverage, or Affordable coverage.
The triangulation of History,
Science and Public Health puts me in my seat studying the Novel Coronavirus of
2019 about six to twelve hours a day. Except of course during a winter retreat
for a week.
Because I am not a research
scientist but a clinical health care worker with front line expertise, I am not
as knowledgeable of what could be next. But we have the internet and social
media which when put to good use and tethered with technology is an open door,
a mirror, an unknown realm intertwining or as Buddhist and others describe it
Indra’s net.
We look back to history of
Pandemic Flu of 1917-18, Polio, Swine Flu, SARS, MERS, and Wuhan 2019 nCoV or
whatever its new name will be. We have our regular Influenza every year which
kills thousands and sickens many more. I just wish the numbers of those cases
could be tabulated to see how many of them availed themselves of Influenza
vaccines as imperfect as they are. Many health care workers shun the Flu
vaccines. They can spread Flu to their patients. There is talk of the enormous
cost and burden that is put on Public Health care by those who do not vaccinate
against the “regular flu” but are now scared of the unknowns in the Novel
Corona Virus of 2019. Would they get vaccinated if a vaccine for it
existed?
In China the clampdown on those
sick or not with the virus is creating a screen for the Chinese Communist Party
to “disappear” people. This reminds me of the brutalization that occurred during
what we know of Mao’s time by Red Guards and others. I am not alone with those
thoughts. It is part of the continuing saga of China. Let me say the Chinese
army is always ready to go. It is huge, it is always training. It can do good,
but it is still an army, that carries out orders. At this time, it appears the
orders are a travesty. A devolution of a culture. Building a hospital quickly
is a marvel. Taking care of the health of a country requires a lot more than
technical ability.
Germ Theory and Koch’s Postulate
on how to define disease were discovered and implemented to save humans and
sentient beings. They work to help us cross all barriers with compassion. The
use of evidence-based science and biology to educate people about Public
Health. That is a true cultural revolution.
Note: as of 2/11/2020; this Novel
Corona Virus is called COVID-19 short for COrona VIrus Disease
as named by the WHO.
People are going missing who
reported on this disease. There is a mounting international out-cry.
It is spreading and may be able
to be inhaled because it aerosols into fine mists in the environment.
There is a chance of quick
turnaround of reinfection after the initial one is cleared.
Diana JiFu Lakis
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