“These things happened. They were glorious and they changed the world. … And then we f*cked up the endgame.”
– Charlie Wilson, former Congressman from Texas
March 5. Westport, Conn.
Fifty people attend a birthday party. At that time, there were no known cases in Westport. Eleven days later, there were 270 cases in Fairfield County, where Westport is. Half of the individuals at the birthday party who were tested, tested positive. One is dead. With less than 1 percent of the population of Connecticut, Fairfield County now had 65 percent of the COVID-19 cases in the state.
March 10. Mount Vernon, Wash.
Sixty members of a church choir attended practice, despite active COVID-19 in Seattle, an hour away. They refrained from contact, utilized good hand hygiene. As of March 29, 45 had been diagnosed with COVID-19 and two were dead.
April 2. Sacramento, Calif.
A Pentecostal church accounts for 71 cases of COVID-19, one-third of the cases in the region. One parishioner is dead.
These are all true stories. Stories of individuals who just wanted to continue their lives, just wanted to do the things that give them comfort, just thought that one little get-together would be fine.
Our lives have changed. It’s a near certainty that some of these changes are permanent. How we interact with each other. How we utilize technology. How we educate our children. How we go to the doctor. COVID-19 will be a turning point in global history. At some point down the road, we will look back and reflect: What happened? How did we get here? What should we have done differently?
For a month, now, these changes have dominated our lives. The challenges and pain of that reality are settling in. Children are stir-crazy and their parents are feeling the stress. Families deprived of income are applying for unemployment in numbers not seen since the Great Depression. Small businesses and even hospitals are wondering how they will survive. The temptation to cheat social distancing – with backyard barbecues, a playdate, spring break – grows. People are starting to assert that “it’s their right” to go out and do as they please, be it attending church services or family gatherings.
At the moment, we’re doing well here in Vermont. You can reference a social-distancing scoreboard based on tracking of cell phone data released by unacast.com. Vermont currently gets a “B” grade, with a 65-70 percent reduction in nonessential visits. That’s impressive, given those pains and the rural environment. For many of us, the grocery store is not just around the corner.
Tom Nichols, a professor at the U.S. Naval War College and author of “The Death of Expertise,” says, “America for several years has become a fundamentally unserious country.”
When I read that quote, various Super Bowl advertisements popped into my head, and I wondered if Nichols might be correct. How will we feel about ourselves in a month? In two months? What will be our Unacast grade?
Will COVID-19 permeate your neighborhood gathering, even though you told everyone to stay 6 feet apart? Because, if we’re honest here, you’re not going to stay 6 feet apart. You’ll slide past each other on trips to the bathroom. Every one of you will interact with the person at the grill. And maybe you’ll have hosted the next Westport, Conn., birthday party.
But, reflecting on Vermont’s response to Hurricane Irene, we are not people who wilt easily, nor are we people who shirk responsibility. We have experience weathering difficult times. We have been places that we don’t want to be. I believe that our experience will not be that of Italy, or Seattle, or New York. We understand that it is our responsibility to care for our neighbors. We understand that our rights do not extend to activities that endanger others. We understand that a playdate to relieve a little stress has consequences, and is not worth our elderly neighbor dying alone on a ventilator because the hospital cannot allow visitors. We simply must stay the course. We must stay home.
In closing, I request that when you need to go out in public for essential errands, such as grocery shopping or to the pharmacy, wear a mask. This is new and confusing for some, given that it is contradictory to earlier messaging. I am hopeful you have seen this guidance from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) or the Vermont Department of Health, but if not I will explain here. With the extensive research surrounding COVID-19, we have learned that a large percentage of individuals carrying coronavirus don’t have any symptoms. They look fine and they feel fine. They look fine sliding past you in the grocery store aisles, they look fine at the play date you arranged to get your kids to stop whining, they look fine at your backyard barbecue. So why am I asking you to wear a mask if it’s true that a cloth or surgical mask doesn’t protect you from coronavirus? I’m asking because those masks do stop the spray of virus quite well when you cough, sneeze, or even breathe. So when you wear a mask, you protect everyone around you. And if we all wear masks, we are all protected.
Wear a mask. Stay home. Think about the endgame.
Joshua T. White, MD, MBA
Chief Medical Officer
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For more information about coronavirus, visit healthvermont.gov. Additionally, you may call 2-1-1 with questions.
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Gifford is a community hospital in Randolph, Vt., with family health centers in Berlin, Bethel, Chelsea, Randolph, Rochester, and White River Junction; and specialty services throughout central Vermont. A Federally Qualified Health Center and a Top 100 Critical Access Hospital in the country, Gifford is a full-service hospital with a 24-hour emergency department and inpatient unit; many surgical services; a day care; two adult day programs; and the 30-bed Menig Nursing Home, which was named by U.S. News & World Report as one of the best 39 nursing homes in the country in 2012. The Birthing Center, established in 1977, was the first in Vermont to offer an alternative to traditional hospital-based deliveries, and continues to be a leader in midwifery and family-centered care. The hospital’s mission is to improve individuals’ and community health by providing and assuring access to affordable, high-quality health care in Gifford’s service area.
