In the past six years I’ve forged a career in health insurance. I know a lot about healthcare. I know the difference between a prosthetic and an orthotic. I know what a duodenoduodenostomy is and how to pronounce it. I can explain the difference between a psychiatrist and a psychologist. Despite years of experience, there’s a sentence I’ve depended on for legal and liability purposes.
“I’m sorry, I can’t answer that. I’m not medically trained.”
It is difficult to admit we are out of our depth. It is difficult to admit others are smarter, more prepared, more adept and more educated. Before I was ever enrolled in kindergarten my family regarded me as a “know-it-all,” and I’ve earned and re-earned that reputation continuously for over 20 years. I’m rarely shy if I believe I have vital information in a conversation. If you claim John Glenn is the first American in space I’ll be chiming in about Alan Shepard before you’ve reached the period in your sentence. It’s grating, it’s obnoxious, but it’s who I am. But it is time. If ever there was a moment to shut up and listen, we are in it.
Our national discourse these past two months has been heavy on the subject of coronavirus. As a nation and a state we watched other regions lose citizens in staggering, terrifying numbers. At the beginning of March it was on our doorstep, and our losses and our infected continue to rise. There is a lot of blame to be passed around, to be certain, but there is a lot of effort needed first.
Among the many dangers we have identified as coronavirus has ravaged our nation is the pervasiveness of misinformation. Some of it has been relatively sensible in nature, such as the suggested use of hydroxychloroquine as a treatment despite the drugs not passing clinical trials in the US, China, and several other countries.
Others have been decidedly non-sensible, like the “meme” which circulated social media in early March suggesting people swish water and spit every 15 minutes to clean out the COVID-19 cells. Naturally, we can assume the solution to a global virus will not be the same as a poppyseed wedged in your teeth.
Still others have been downright dangerous and irresponsible. A suggestion that imbibing disinfectant such as Lysol or bleach could protect people was circulated last week, from a rather prominent source. Myself, I still remember the stark terror of my childhood when my parents thought my youngest brother had drank bleach as a toddler. I daresay most of us immediately recognized this was poor advice to be avoided. Sadly, not all, as New York reported dozens of emergency room cases related to consumption of household cleaning products, as did Kentucky.
There are a lot of problems with the previous picture, and the debate has raged all week, fingers pointed in all directions. One that I feel didn’t get enough traction is how we determine who to listen to. This sounds like an easy answer: Doctors, nurses, medical professionals. The people who not only know how to pronounce duodenoduodenostomy but also know how to perform one (it’s a surgical procedure.) The thing about doctors and nurses right now, though, is they’re telling us a whole lot of things we don’t want to hear. With news coming in all directions, how do we choose to believe the worst of it?
A psychological concept has been identified in humans dating back as far as 460 B.C. It’s now known as “confirmation bias,” and it is our tendency to absorb information that reinforces our previously held beliefs, and dismiss or reject information that is contrasting. In other words, we hear what we want to hear and dismiss what we don’t. When case after case of sexual misconduct were levied against Bill Cosby, we saw confirmation bias in action. The charming, jovial, avuncular Cosby had been widely admired as a good person for decades. It was hard to believe he had a violently criminal dark side, and easier to believe the accusations were false. Many believed his denials until the gavel came down on his prison sentence, and plenty still hold to his innocence.
This moment in history, however, has stakes that are far too high to allow us to indulge in our confirmation bias. It is easy for us to say we will be fine, easy to believe we can survive cutting a corner here, making an exception there. It’s even easy to believe we have a fundamental right to do as we please regardless of the danger. In addition to not being medically trained, I’m not constitutionally trained so I’ll leave that one alone. But my moral training tells me we are wrong to defy medical orders. Wrong to flout and cheat and cut our corners. We must admit to ourselves that cutting corners means others will die. And we must decide if the death of a stranger, a friend, a family member, a human being is worth our golf game, as defined by the Bill of Rights.
There has been inconsistent messaging throughout this crisis from all corners except one. The healthcare industry, with Dr. Anthony Fauci at the forefront, has insisted on telling us exactly what we needed to hear but didn’t want to hear. It’s been annoying, boring, uncomfortable, but necessary. It continues to be necessary, as our statewide and nationwide statistics have dipped in the past week, but not anything close to a decisive point. That’s not my opinion, because, well, you know. Those are the opinions of the aforementioned doctors and nurses, and I know that because I listened to them.
Doctors and nurses are dying at an alarming rate. They have a choice, naturally, to either resign their posts or show up and fight, but the nature of the business makes it abundantly clear most will choose to fight. Choose to die. Choose to sacrifice their hopes and dreams and hobbies, their retirements and vacations and their children’s affection for the public good. It’d be great to believe this is all overblown, but we know better. We know on March 1 there were 50,000 more of us than there are today. As of the most updated figures 56,521 Americans have died. That exceeds the capacity of Dodger Stadium, the largest park in Major League Baseball by capacity. Over 1 million Americans have tested positive for COVID-19. That is nearly 1 in every 33 people in this country. If you have more than 33 people you consider friends and family, the odds are likely COVID-19 will enter your social circle.
It’s time for us to believe it can happen to us. It’s time for us to believe it can happen to our friends. It’s time to believe we are at risk and we are responsible for others who are at risk. It’s time to listen to the only people who have been telling us the harsh, uncomfortable truth from the people who have the most to lose and the least to gain. It’s time to stay home. Doctor’s orders.
Doug Sears, Jr. is a writer, columnist, and podcaster for Watershed Voice.
Editor’s Note: This story was updated at 12:04 p.m. Tuesday, April 28 to correct the statistic about Americans who have tested positive for COVID-19 from 1 in every 33 Americans to 1 in every 330 Americans. We apologize for any confusion this may have caused.
