I have been so delayed in updating this blog that many of you are likely unaware of the significance I ascribe to March 23rd, 2020. Or maybe that date’s significance is the reason for my delay.
Either way, I apologise. The very representation of a key epidemiological concept is playing out across the globe right now and there have been many chances to startle and galvanise us to continue the fight for population health. I’m also apologising to myself because writing through uncertainty always lightens the load.
The fourth stage of the “epidemiological transition”, a standard concept in human geography, is characterised by globalisation, increasing life expectancy, rapid population ageing, and a considerable non-communicable disease burden. At first glance, this may look like progress – the eradication of transmissible diseases that once killed babies and young children, as well as their mothers, would surely mean that more individuals could be healthy into old age. But the growing threats of cardiovascular disease, obesity, and other chronic conditions have the potential to lessen individual dignity in spite of revolutionary medical advances, and the dizzying movement of people and goods, especially coupled with rising socioeconomic inequality and antibiotic resistance, has created an optimum environment for emerging infectious diseases. Most of the world’s medium- and high-income countries, with some notable exceptions (life expectancy high-achievers without staggering inequality), are reaching this stage.
This virus may hardly be alive in the biomedical sense, but our globe’s daily activities and priorities keep it content.
This may already be obvious to you, and I will get to my chosen date’s relevance soon. Just one important point first, though – I pulled up the latest statistics on the pandemic recently, something I hadn’t done in a while, to illustrate its severity in writing, and found that the numbers, or at least their proportions, were not the most shocking. I will not equate them to the “Spanish” flu of 1918, for example, whose estimated death toll made up more than 3 percent of the world population that year.
Of course, our current global figure of 974,000 deaths is no small number, and it’s hardly one that can be counted on your hands and feet. Because data can seem far away and theoretical to the most experienced scientists among us, I will instead highlight a different facet of COVID’s impact.
A nuclear family visiting someone they love in the intensive care unit today will see more wires and flashing lights than the same family would have in 1918. They will receive more breaking news notifications on their devices than they would have in 1957, the year of another devastating influenza pandemic in Asia. They will be shielded behind more layers of plastic and disposable fabric than ever before.
No amount of suffering can be minimised. I need to keep that in mind, like we all do.
March 23rd marked the first full day of the UK’s lockdown. The previous week had seen me say my quickest goodbyes, accompany my last musical theatre choir rehearsal of Dear Evan Hansen’s “You Will Be Found”, and stuff my recital dresses into a navy blue suitcase before hanging them back in my closet an hour later.
The weather became unremarkable and the air itself seemed to hold its breath. Every insignificant noise outside was amplified. The kitchen utensils and cheers around the block each week at 8 p.m. sounded like they came from an empty concert hall. Because of evolving restrictions, I was moved to a new student accommodation, and then another. I needed to learn how to cook properly, and my flatmates and my neighbourhood changed in rapid succession …
I was lucky that many crucial aspects of my life remained the same, like my health, my loved ones’ presence, and my stash of non-perishable Chinese delights. The one most pertinent to this anniversary, however, was the existence of the charity Medical Supply Drive UK.
Six months before today, a handful of doctors in London took inspiration from a Georgetown-University-student-led project to deliver donated personal protective equipment (PPE) to healthcare workers in need and set up a similar network in the UK after hearing about supply shortages from their own NHS colleagues. Local businesses alerted them with news that their labs or studios had hundreds of unused surgical masks, and the team directed the items to the hospitals or GP surgeries that had requested them most urgently.
I joined the charity (which was not a certified nonprofit at the time) as a Twitter volunteer, given that I had neither the driver’s license nor the guts to deliver PPE myself. I had little relevant experience, but was keen enough to do something with my suddenly cleared schedule. Many of my fellow UCL students joined for the same reason, only with an added sense of obligation to their future colleagues as medics.
No matter my surroundings, there was always MSDUK work to do. Every post was spontaneous, based on changing regulations and circumstances. Our three-hour-long meetings at the beginning of this journey made us feel like we had met in class or at work, even though most of us were strangers beforehand. We have grown to celebrate our treasured anniversaries and offer a virtual shoulder to each other when tragedy strikes.
I used to think that my current role, social media management, couldn’t be a “real job” because I wasn’t the one approving donations or putting them in doctors’ hands. I still believe that sometimes, but I’ve expanded my repertoire since March to include designing infographics that will be disseminated to over a thousand people, and I’ve got our team organised with plans for the future. I promise to keep going, and I know that everything will be worth the effort.
If you want to find hope, consider volunteering.
Med Supply Drive UK has delivered over 200,000 pieces of PPE to the health and social care frontline to date and hopes to give even more to the individuals who deserve the safest working conditions possible. We continue to fundraise via GoFundMe to research new ways of manufacturing sustainable PPE, cover logistical costs of future donations, and advocate for evidence-based infection control policy in the UK.
I’m writing about all this because I want to thank you. I couldn’t have invested so much time into this charity without your support. Also, if you are reading this, you have probably told me off at least once for staying up until 3 a.m. because I felt like doing so, and I thank you, too, for that insistent kindness.
Let’s wish for a better world in the next six months. Maybe something like this:
Illustrations by @portraitsforppe (www.instagram.com/portraitsforppe)
The Study of Empathy 