We have recently been fully immersed in the next wave in my ICU. Since August we've been hovering at 25-50% COVID patients in our small unit. When I left yesterday morning we had 10/12 beds with intubated COVID patients. Two coded and died yesterday (one was 38 years old) and then another not yet intubated, was admitted into one room and a NON-COVID! was admitted to the other. So we're 9/12, 8 intubated and we think one might survive, one probably died while I was home today. I'll find out when I get there for my shift tonight.
I was talking with my husband about whether if this had happened say 10-15 years ago, would we still have this seemingly political divide between vaccinated/not vaccinated. He was pointing out to me that the mortality rate is something like 0.016% and trying to rationalize something and I feel badly but I just sort of snapped at him. I told him I don't care what the mortality rate is. My pandemic is made up of those 0.016% and their deaths have been awful and frustrating and now that they largely seem preventable they're just worse. We put 10 people on ventilators in the past week knowing full well that almost all of them will die. I admit that four of the patients that have died since August were vaccinated. However, they all had significant comorbidities. The rest of them weren't vaccinated and many of them were angry at us right up until they went on the vent. And even if it is only 0.016%, it's going to end up being more than a million people in the US. A MILLION PEOPLE that were someone's mother, father, wife, husband, child, etc.
I believe in science, so I guess it's hypocritical of me to say that I don't care about math. But I don't. Because a number doesn't capture people. And doesn't capture what it feels like to go into work knowing you can't do what you trained for. We can't save these people. They're dying ugly deaths and we can't do anything.
