She listens to the world move [beat, two-three, beat] like old people listen to talk radio. And flutters in her own world, wild thing, she programs an image to her brain:
reality
it crashes.
Much like a ballet, she falls when she fears the music is stopping. [pressing her cheek against her knee] Then valiantly she jumps and spins, [twirling two, three, spinning two, three]
But eventually, all music ends;
fallen on the stage
alone.
If you connected with this poem, the comments section is for you to share your thoughts and/or experiences.I am grateful to anyone that chooses to share – I make that space for you.Thank you for taking the time to read this poem today.
This is a pretty loaded topic. Breaking this one up into several parts. In this post I’m addressing limitations to medical accessibility, such as uninsured rates, caregiving, and religious exemption from government advised or required disease control practices, such as social distancing. Let’s talk about human behavior and how that may impact the vulnerability of your location in the United States to coronavirus.
Accessibility, Uninsured Rates, and Alternative Medicine
There are many reasons Americans are uninsured. Being uninsured will ultimately lead to limited access to healthcare. Due to decisions that were made regarding how to implement mandated healthcare, the poor were punished for not being able to afford exorbitantly priced healthcare. I don’t care who you blame for it not working. Point is, it didn’t, and now we’re sunk. You may notice a similarity between the map above and the maps in my previous post on the closure of rural hospitals and poverty. Texas and Oklahoma are currently set up to be the two of the hardest hit states by coronavirus because these are uninsured populationsthat feel they cannot seek already-limited healthcare (because hospitals closed). This means that they turn to alternative medicine at home and don’t call a doctor due to the cost. Alternative medicine, though potentially complementary (waiting on research), doesn’t involve providing ventilators to people drowning from their own viral lung inflammation. Alternative medicine doesn’t necessarily involve reporting confirmed cases to the state, either.
Luckily, telemedicine is slowly stepping up the game at reducing costs and improving accessibility, but until we have Point of Care testing that allows for mass screening that could be distributed to a population via the health department – good luck. The FDA still strictly prohibits self administered tests. This is one of the major outstanding limitations preventing telemedicine from serving our most underserved and vulnerable populations in the United States during this pandemic.
Religious exemptions for medical care are a real thing. I know there are people reading this that are going to think, “but no one in their right mind is thinking that now!”
Oh honey, I wish I could say that was so. Let me first introduce you to What’s The Harm. Even without coronavirus, people are and will be dying due to lack of access to medical care in part because their families opt out via religious exemptions. When this is combined with alternative methods gone wrong and cultural factors, the vulnerability of this population is amplified by pre-existing public health issues.
When we care for the sick at home, a variety of other factors come into play that may delay or prevent access to medical intervention or reporting. Cultural norms around illness, including distrust of the medical system, preference for home care, and family caregiving will play their roles in the spread of COVID-19.
This means that children and older family members that do have symptoms may not have access to medical intervention, documentation, advice, or have sufficient care or separation from family members. While these deep-rooted beliefs come from a nurturing and caring place of love, it is important that cases at least be documented. These practices currently put families and communities at high risk of having the virus spread within them. While we do have recommendations for caregivers and home care instructions for coronavirus patients, they are not practical options, nor sufficient for the average family in America.