Dispatch From Thermopylae: Report From An ER Doc In A Top 10 COVID Hot Spot

[hatrack]

EDIT

The Thanksgiving surge was pretty bad, we thought. Until the post Christmas surge. From a medicine standpoint it got steadily worse. There were more patients, and they were sicker than ever. And still, people just wouldn’t damn do right. My wife is a critical care nurse, and when we would make runs to the stores, we’d be stunned to see still see far too many people in our blood red state not wearing masks, not distancing, and we’d see posts on social media of big gatherings of unmasked fools. All the while, the numbers continued to climb.

EDIT

That was around the time the level of COVID denial went to ‘Certifiably Insane’. I was screamed at and threatened for over an hour by a family whose loved one had to be transferred out of state for specialized care we (and no one else local) were able to provide. They demanded she be sent to their hospital of choice, and simply refused to believe that is was not possible. “I don’t think you know who we are!” They even called their congressman (who they ‘knew personally’). After they got off the phone with him, they looked shell-shocked. Suddenly, privilege and entitlement had gotten them exactly nowhere. Finally, after hours wasted, the patient got airlifted.

We have treated dying patients who screamed at us that they didn’t have COVID. They denied it to the bitter end. I had a family demand that all evidence of COVID be scrubbed from the medical records their now-deceased family member. When I explained that it was a legal document, and I could not change it, even if I wanted to...which I did not... they threatened to sue me, the hospital and any physician who had written a note in the chart. No words.

The beds are always full, now. All of them. Everywhere. We keep multiple holds in the ER because there is nowhere else for them to go. Ventilator patients, COVID patients, trauma patients, everyone. We have to wait for a discharge or a death upstairs to get them moved out. We have triaged, examined, worked up, admitted, treated and discharged patients who never saw anything but their exam room in the ED.

EDIT

https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2021/1/26/2010556/-Dispatch-from-Thermopylae-Update-from-an-ER-doc-in-a-top-ten-COVID-hot-spot

[mitch96]

1. Some people are in such denial it's sickening. Not the truth but what they want to believe. SFB

AKA Shit For Brains... Tell them they have cancer, second oppinion they believe you...
COVID? nope..
I'm glad I don't have to deal with people like that any more.
m

[cstanleytech]

12. I blame Trump and his fucking ass tonguing Republican lackeys both in the Senate and House as well

as the ones in the White House and in the media such as at Fox News.
Had they all not pushed the fake news bullshit and down played the virus the number of deaths we seeing might well have been avoided.

[UpInArms]

2. That is a must read

Thank you for posting

[mountain grammy]

3. Excellent! Thanks for posting.

absolutely mind boggling.

[hatrack]

4. And it just keeps getting dumber and angrier and more defiant out there . . .

Some months back, I opined at my cynical worst that the basic problem with COVID denial was that not enough people had died.

And that's the question I still keep asking. How many have to die for MAGA Nation to accept that Reality Roulette just handed them a shitcookie? 1 million? 2 million? 5 million?

Does every family in America have to lose a first-degree relative before people start wearing masks and staying away from large group gatherings?

[BSdetect]

5. If the deny Covid then let them go without treatment if beds are short etc

Treat those who act responsibly

Imagine having to tolerate such abuse from such ignorant patients

[Duppers]

8. Exactly.

[Karadeniz]

6. The full article brought tears to my eyes.

[wnylib]

7. If I were a health care worker,

I think I'd make it easier on myself and tell the denial patients and their families that they have a highly infectious form of pneumonia, then treat them for covid and do contact tracing because it is such a contagious form of pneumonia.

Or, tell them, "You're right. You don't have covid. Who's next?" Let them go home or to another doctor.

[llashram]

9. ALL TRUMP'S FAULT

his first big lethal lie that has continued to kill people. Both innocents and the ignorant. We know the 2nd big trump lie. It got more people killed, hundreds injured and a Capitol Building sacked and in disarray.

[KS Toronado]

10. These brainwashed people deny so many things tRump told them was a hoax

Covid, election, wonder if they'll refuse $15 an hour when it's thrust on them because it'll ruin the economy?
Time to teach critical thinking skills in school.

[Rebl2]

11. Just insane

What these families demanded. They have drunk the juice (don’t want to involve the kids drink in this) and it poisoned their minds and also killed some of them.

[calimary]

13. Thanks a LOT, donald.

This one, too...
Is on YOU.

[BobTheSubgenius]

14. Can you even imagine how bad it would be if this virus wasn't a hoax?

Maybe it's real in some states, but not in others? That seems like a workable hypothesis.

[BSdetect]

15. k&r