Last week, the local news station showed a young man, no older than 25, on Clearwater Beach saying something along the lines of: “I’m not afraid of the coronavirus. It’s not going to stop me from getting drunk.”
I’m sure some of us are no different from the guy on the beach; we just aren’t expressing our thoughts on a local news station. Maybe we are still going to the gym, a bar, or a restaurant. I know I was until last week.
At our age, we tend to see ourselves as invincible. We jump out of perfectly good airplanes, snorkel with sharks, and eat Whataburger at 3 a.m. This conviction has been present since the dawn of man; young people believe they have their whole lives ahead of them, and the older generation naturally believes the opposite. Why we have this mindset is unimportant. What matters is that we acknowledge it, so that we can avoid decisions as a consequence of this outlook.
Recently, my father, a gynecological oncologist who has practiced for more than 25 years, displayed a trait I have rarely seen in him — fear. He fears for the health of his patients that require surgery to remove cancerous tumors from their bodies. He is afraid for his patients undergoing chemotherapy and their ability to protect themselves from the virus. He is afraid that he might be infected by the virus from his contact with patients at the hospital. Because if he gets sick, who will care for his patients?
Most articles and news stations have noted these secondary effects of avoiding social distancing and ignoring Centers for Disease Control and Prevention guidelines. By now, hopefully, we are all well aware of them.
But what struck me were the questions that followed these statements from my father. What if the disease continues to spread? What if his hospital runs out of room? Then doctors like him will have to make utilitarian decisions on who receives care — and ultimately, who lives and who dies. In other words, the 35-year-old over the 85-year-old. Anguish washed over him as he thought about having to make this decision.
No doctor wants to play God. Doctors swear an oath to protect patients, not to harm them. But if the contagion surges above our healthcare capacity, they may be forced to be judge, jury, and executioner for patients via triage.
Of course, the short-term effect of this decision is a hospital bed for one person, but not another. The long-term effect is that once this pandemic passes, doctors can no longer live with themselves. How will nurses and other medical staff react? Losing a patient is hard enough, but consciously choosing to let a patient die is something doctors do not usually have to do.
Now consider that your decisions today, tomorrow, and until this virus is contained have far-reaching consequences that go beyond your own health. Our actions could not only hurt people physically but emotionally as well. And unlike the physical effects of this virus, the emotional effects on our medical personnel cannot be quantified. This reality should scare us even more.
Fear is an incredible tool. It can either cause a person to panic or focus. Hopefully, the unknowable consequences of our actions scare us into doing what is right. Hopefully, we’ll forget about the beer and think about others. If we don’t, it will be the consequences we cannot imagine that could hurt us the most.
Steven Arango is currently clerking for a U.S. federal district judge. After completing his clerkship, he will return to active duty in the Marine Corps as a judge advocate. The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily represent the views of the U.S. Marine Corps, Department of the Navy, Department of Defense, or the U.S. government.
