by Katie Oppenheim
As most of you know, I am a nurse and President of the 6,000 member nurse’s union at UM. Our members have stepped up to the plate in remarkable ways, in spite of the understandable fear and anxiety associated with caring for patients during this pandemic. Beginning in mid-March absolutely everything changed at the hospital. The Emergency Department was swamped with very, very sick patients. Unfortunately, there has been a lot of death associated with this pandemic. Thus, the importance of #staysafestayhome. It works! At our peak, we had about 250 COVID patients at UM and are now down to about 100. This is great news, but this is not over and certainly won’t be for at least another 18 months or until a vaccine is found to be effective.
Fast forward to last week. The COVID census is down but the normal work is not back and will take many months to return. The University announced significant losses – hundreds of millions of dollars over the course of just 1 month. So, now we don’t have enough work for everybody and they are asking people to take voluntary furloughs or decrease their work hours. People are still scared and anxious, only now it is for their jobs.
I share all of this detail because the moral distress we have all felt is real and will continue. PTSD will likely only begin to appear in a big way in the next 6 months to a year. It is spring, flowers are beginning to bloom, the weather (most days) is getting better and people who have been staying home are getting antsy. I ask for your patience to protect sanitation workers, grocery store and drugstore clerks, first responders and of course all who work in health care facilities. #bekind #stayhome #wearamask #washyourhands Peace, Katie
Image by Mohammad Fahim from Pixabay