Orville Taylor | Nursing a grievance

A nurse died, a front-line essential worker who is fighting the war on COVID-19, and she picked up the virus on the job while working at the Percy Junor Hospital. It is a reality check though often, the cheque that the healthcare workers have to cash is blank. She makes four. Two retired nurses, women, who made the ultimate sacrifice by giving back to an ungrateful public sector died. They were stalwarts who either needed the additional income because the pension is as skinny as the ‘maaga dog’ Peter Tosh sang about or more likely because of their love for humanity and the service gene being entangled in their DNA. The other victim of the virus was a neophyte, a trainee, who was yet to absorb the knowledge needed to fully serve us.

The 40-year-old registered nurse was right in the middle and had another 20 or so years left. Her death was not the last straw. However, the response by the political leadership and the technocrats turned the dromedary camel into a quadriplegic llama. She had been under the care of her colleagues in the type C facility. However, as she worsened, she was shuttled to the University Hospital of the West Indies on my plantation, where she waited on a ventilator and ultimately succumbed.

Deeply hurt, her co-workers felt that as a front-line worker, she should have been given priority. In reply, our prime Manager, Andrew Holness, said: “In these matters, once it comes to care, then only the standard medical triage would apply. There wouldn’t be any predetermined priority list. That would be problematic.” In principle, it is difficult to disagree with Holness. The problem is, he is a politician, and by his own admission, people do not believe him. Remember, local and international surveys on Jamaica indicate that more than 84 per cent of Jamaicans disbelieve politicians and 74 per cent think elected officials cannot be trusted.

These words, however, should never have come from his mouth, ‘wussalackahow’ there is an implicit finger pointing from the medical fraternity that the blame for the spike in infections lies squarely at the feet of the politicians, who ‘flew the gate’ against their better guidance. True, it was undisciplined Jamaicans, who believe that they have nine lives like cats. Cats will never ignore butter put on their mouths. Yet cats and dogs don’t have the same luck, and we as children remember how much trouble we got into when we said that ‘dog go a market!’

FUEL TO THE FIRE

Thus, even when the medical experts led by the chief medical officer supported the prime minister, it added fuel to the fire. It is a slippery slope because there is absolutely no life that is more important than others. Medical training, even for first-aiders, revolves around a triage system. It is a system of evaluation where the most critical is addressed first. Thus “the assignment of degrees of urgency to wounds or illnesses to decide the order of treatment of a large number of patients or casualties”. The social, political, or economic status of the patient is of no consequence. Believe it or not, the training says that if the gunman who shot the policeman is more severely wounded and is in death’s back yard, he must be given priority over the cop who took evasive action.

But what is the protocol in a war or national emergency situation, when multiple lives are at risk? Who do you save first? On an aircraft, there is no question that the pilots must put on their masks first when oxygen levels decline. Passengers are instructed that the adults and those who are taking care of the vulnerable must mask up and put on their life jackets ‘before’ attempting to assist anyone, including their own children.

For that reason, therefore, when there was pushback from some elements over security forces getting the vaccine in the tranche after healthcare workers, I was in full support of the Government. After all, ambulances get first path, fire trucks next, and then police vehicles when the needy sirens are telling us “we want!”

So in that reasoning space, is there any room for the argument that when we save the life of a nurse or doctor as a priority we potentially save the lives of dozens of individuals?

All lives matter, but I empathise with those nurses who withdrew their labour even if on the surface it appears to be unlawful industrial action. Inasmuch as we have to take personal responsibility for our safety by doing all we can to stay out of the overcrowded hospitals, we have to recognise that policy deeply affects those persons who are required to carry it out.

So perhaps like the constabulary having its medical services branch, the military having many of its own internal institutions, can we have a dedicated hospital or space for healthcare personnel?

- Dr Orville Taylor is head of the Department of Sociology at The University of the West Indies, a radio talk-show host, and author of ‘Broken Promises, Hearts and Pockets’. Email feedback to columns@gleanerjm.com and tayloronblackline@hotmail.com.