A recent January letter to advice columnist Carolyn Hax raised the following question: do people opposed to wearing masks deserve health care? Ms Hax’ nuanced response included a variety of reasons why we should provide healthcare to the anti-maskers, among them basic fairness, expectations of care, our social contract, and humans making possible biases denial decisions. In other words, a very moral and positive response – that no matter what they’d or who they were, in we were to deny care, we’d be embarking on the “slippery slope” of danger – where would it stop?
Ms Hax is a better person than I am. I think there should be – in this case – some accountability, IF we get to the point of rationing. There are many issues and angles in this – so let us begin.
1] The Trump administration issued a “Denial of Care Rule,” which authorized health care workers to decide who receives care and who doesn’t. Under the rule, health care workers can use their personal religious or moral beliefs to justify denying care – with no limits on what constitutes a refusal.
There are numerous public examples of this being done, from denial of prescriptions, refusal to follow end-of-life wishes, denial of health care to people in extreme health crises. and so on.
So – legally, denial of opponents of world wide standards of medical practice in a pandemic, would seem to be an easy fit. Health care workers, morally repulsed by these people, who are sabotaging them – should be entitled to denials, right?
2] Consider this. World wide, doctors and nurses have been literally begging people to wear masks and social distance. They have done this through many media outlets.
In a 11/29/20 statement, a nurse said: “We’re not the front line. We’re the last line. When we say the front line is failing, it’s our population, it’s our community.” In a 11/18/20 statement, s doctor said: “Right now we need more help. The honor code [“personal responsibility”] system is killing us.”
3] The effect on medical personnel. In late July, 2020, around 120,000 American health care workers had tested positive and 587 had died. That is only the beginning .
Consider this 11/16/20 article: “Pandemic-stressed doctors calling it quits:” 8% of doctors closed their offices recently; another 4% planned to close soon; other doctors and nurses are retiring early; 20% of primary care doctors say they knew of an impending retirement and 15% said they knew somebody who quit or planned to quit.
Consider this 12/25/20 article: “Already pushed to brink, nurses fear what’s ahead,” they’re “frightened by what people are doing, or not doing; one nurse is haunted by daily death counts. “These nurses are not only exhausted, they are angry with those who flout pleas to stay home, stay safe.”
Then there is this article: “Public health care workers face vitriol” [6/23/20}: “they’re being personally attacked for doing their job; there are ARMED protesters at their homes; at least one director had an armed escort. One result” there is “an exodus of public health officials” across America.
Then there is this article, 12/6/20: “COVID’ toll on mental health,” discussing how psychiatrists now have a vital role in treating MEDICAL HEALTH PROFESSIONALS. A Wuhan , China, study found 70% of health care workers reported depression, anxiety, and insomnia. Multiple doctors, world wide have committed suicide.
Add this: the stress and strain on “first responders” is also intense. On veteran East Coast EMT person reported being in therapy for years. He also reported a recent suicide.
So – under the government’s official rules – do American medical personnel have valid grounds for refusing to treat people who’ve openly sabotaged them, have refused to listen to their professional advice, have helped cause the death of colleagues, and, often – sickness of themselves or people in their homes?
4] Consider this 10/24/20 article: “Study finds masks are easiest, cheapest way to save lives. Consider articles on how the “bubbles” used by some pro sports enabled them to finish the 2019-2020 seasons, and this: “..the thing that made it successful in the first place was the adherence to all those protocols that most people can follow most of the time in their lives.”
So – this is NOT “rocket science,” it is simply doing very basic health practices.
5] So – how much “freedom of speech, press, assembly, petition” should Americans expect to reasonably expect to have in a “war.” In this case, a war against a pandemic that has now killed over 400,000 Americans, sickened many more, bankrupted businesses, pushed millions into unemployment, drastically impaired the schooling and mental health of OUR children, K-college???
Consider this “letter” [8/31/20] from “P.P.:” “In a war, you follow orders or else:” “We have been told that we are in a war against COVID-19…I served in another war – as a combat medic in World War II. As a soldier you carry out your orders no matter how uncomfortable or even scary they are. Ignoring orders will win few wars….Aren’t we all soldiers in this war? Do we really want to win it?”
In other wars, people who went too far in protesting the war effort were jailed. A long-standing principle of “freedom of speech” is you can’t falsely yell ‘fire’ in theater. The January 6th invasion of the U.S. Capitol is not “freedom of speech, or assembly>” The Pentagon has called it an “insurrection,” which gets one into the territory of sedition at the very least. What “health rights” do these people have?
6] Travel, “gatherings” “superspreader ” events. Health officials warned against all of these. People did them anyway. And, predictably – people got sick with COVID-19.
So -are all of these merely ‘innocent” human activities? Or, during a pandemic – irresponsible even dangerous? Do all these people have equal “health rights” to the millions who listened and didn’t do them?
7] Anti-vaxxers. People have been openly appearing at anti-vaccine rallies, many of those with political intent. These people are often protesting any manifestation of vaccines. The medical truth is simple: the only way to begin to end the COVID-19 crisis is to vaccinate people – as was done with earlier mass diseases.
So, by definition – anti-vaxxers are sabotaging the only way out of the COVID-19 crisis. This too, is at least on the sedition continuum. If vaccination opponents are successful, we will NEVER end the COVID-19 crisis. If they were to eventually want to take a COVID-19 vaccine, where on the vaccine list do these people “belong?”
8] Political opponents. There have been hundreds/thousands of protest against medical advice like wearing masks, practicing social distancing, closing some forms of business.
Nobody wants to do this – but scientific and medical science says if we don’t do these things, we have little chance of ending COVID-19 destroying “normal” life.
If we are in a war – then are these people guilty of sabotage, sedition, etc.? They think and claim to be right – but world wide evidence says they’re wrong. Do they ‘pay a price” for sabotaging the war effort?
9] Purveyors of misinformation. Numerous people and groups have been circulating falsehoods about COVID-19 and treatments for it. Some in visible manners. Some on line. If we’re in a war against COVID-19, again, are these people engaging in sabotage and sedition? Putting forth propaganda in a war, or giving aid and comfort to an enemy – is usually sedition, sabotage, even treason. people have been executed for such offenses.
The war against COVID-19 has already cost more American lives then World War II combat. Just how serious is sabotaging America’s most deadly war?
10] We have pictures and other data on many of these people. Do these people, who at the very least, have made a united effort against COVID-19 more difficult, have equal health rights to the millions of Americans who did not, who did everything possible to NOT make COVID-19 worse?
So – considering all the above, do medical personnel have the “right” to refuse to treat the opponents of their advice?”
Where on the lists of Americans lining up to get COVID-19 vaccinations should the opponents of these practices be?
Do they suffer any consequences at all? Or, as many of them demand – they are equal, because they were only practicing their “Constitutional rights?”
11] Rationing – ICU beds. Suppose there is only one ICU bed available. There are two claimants. One – YOUR relative, entirely innocent; and – one of the many classes of COVID-19 opponents. Is there a debate? Do medical personnel get to exercise their “moral opinions” as to whom thew bed should go?
12] Rationing – COVID-19 vaccinations. It has seemed there has been little opposition to the point that front line medical workers are #l. It has seemed that ‘first responders” should also be at the top of the list – because their jobs required them to work in hazardous conditions.
Behind these, it seems the public accepts vaccinating classroom teachers, to protect them – but also, so workers can go back to work. And – masks and social distancing will still be practiced.
13] Beyond the above, conflicts arise. There are many claimants – older people, most at risk; meat packing workers – at risk because of work stations and because they’re “essential workers; many “essential workers” in retail; etc.
14] Rationing – COVID-19 – the COVID-19 opponents – when do they get placed? Do they have a valid case? In this war, how much forgiveness do they deserve? Do the millions of Americans who’ve “played by the rules” need to offer those who made their lives more dangerous any concern?
If we are at war – and we are, then the “rights” one might have had in peacetime are reduced. Because – your RESPONSIBILITIES to the rest of us have been increased. Things you do that sabotage the well-being of ALL Americans, regardless of your personal beliefs, cannot – should not – be forgiven.
A favorite “conservative” mantra during the COVID-19 war has been “personal responsibility” [which, nurses and doctors have said Americans failed].
So, under the “conservative” mantra, the consequence of failed “personal responsibility” must include the possibility of being at the very end of the COVID-19 vaccination line.
With Justice For All 