Sharing the air
Read this interesting article today and it brought back memories.
When I was still a working girl, the hospital floor I worked on got almost all of the county's TB patients that had been either diagnosed during their hospitalization or were "non-compliant" with their meds and were in the hospital to see to it that they did, in fact, comply. (I use the quotation marks because I can't stand that word with regard to medical care. Some people have reasons for not agreeing with doctors and/or their care plans, and it often has nothing to do with insolent toddler behavior which the word non-compliant signifies to me. But I digress.)
Normally, I'm all for a person making their own choices about medical care. Many times doctors would refer me to patients who did not consent to treatment. Doctors (and other staff) often wanted me, as the social worker, to go in and convince them to go along with the plan. Sometimes their reasons were well-thought out and reasonable and other staff members simply hadn't taken the time to hear them out. Other times they just didn't understand what the treatment would (or wouldn't) entail because no one had made the time to discuss things in detail with them. I supported all of the patients I worked with in disagreeing with the doctors if I felt like they were making an informed decision, even if their decision wouldn't have been mine. With a singular exception: patients with TB, and particularly those with drug-resistant strains.
If someone forgoes treatment because they would rather face their own demise than endure whatever side effects treatment may include, I'm all for that. But when someone makes the decision to forego treatment and potentially cause me to face my own demise, I'm not for that at all. TB is airborne, and we all share the air.
While it may seem like a human rights violation to lock someone up for not wearing a mask in public, I think it can be turned around. It's a human rights violation to expose me and the rest of the public you come in contact with simply because you don't want to wear a mask. And as far as this fellow in the article is concerned, I have a very hard time believing that no one told him how important it was to wear a mask at all times. Maybe he didn't want to believe it, maybe he thought they were being melodramatic regarding the seriousness of his condition and his ability to spread it to others, but that's not our fault. That's his.
From the sound of the article, he seems to be a person who makes choices reflecting intelligent thought. He was living in Russia, got his TB diagnosis, and returned to the US expecting to get better medical care. All a logical plan. His logic, however, ends there. He then decides that he is the victim and, at least in this article, doesn't seem to show any remorse for his exposing the public that he shared air with in the convienience store. Instead he is angry at the poor treatment he's receiving in jail. I will agree that I don't understand why they took away his TV, computer, etc., when those wouldn't be passed from person to person and would cause no one any harm. But in this case, taking away his personal freedom does seem a reasonable alternative to taking away mine.
When I was still a working girl, the hospital floor I worked on got almost all of the county's TB patients that had been either diagnosed during their hospitalization or were "non-compliant" with their meds and were in the hospital to see to it that they did, in fact, comply. (I use the quotation marks because I can't stand that word with regard to medical care. Some people have reasons for not agreeing with doctors and/or their care plans, and it often has nothing to do with insolent toddler behavior which the word non-compliant signifies to me. But I digress.)
Normally, I'm all for a person making their own choices about medical care. Many times doctors would refer me to patients who did not consent to treatment. Doctors (and other staff) often wanted me, as the social worker, to go in and convince them to go along with the plan. Sometimes their reasons were well-thought out and reasonable and other staff members simply hadn't taken the time to hear them out. Other times they just didn't understand what the treatment would (or wouldn't) entail because no one had made the time to discuss things in detail with them. I supported all of the patients I worked with in disagreeing with the doctors if I felt like they were making an informed decision, even if their decision wouldn't have been mine. With a singular exception: patients with TB, and particularly those with drug-resistant strains.
If someone forgoes treatment because they would rather face their own demise than endure whatever side effects treatment may include, I'm all for that. But when someone makes the decision to forego treatment and potentially cause me to face my own demise, I'm not for that at all. TB is airborne, and we all share the air.
While it may seem like a human rights violation to lock someone up for not wearing a mask in public, I think it can be turned around. It's a human rights violation to expose me and the rest of the public you come in contact with simply because you don't want to wear a mask. And as far as this fellow in the article is concerned, I have a very hard time believing that no one told him how important it was to wear a mask at all times. Maybe he didn't want to believe it, maybe he thought they were being melodramatic regarding the seriousness of his condition and his ability to spread it to others, but that's not our fault. That's his.
From the sound of the article, he seems to be a person who makes choices reflecting intelligent thought. He was living in Russia, got his TB diagnosis, and returned to the US expecting to get better medical care. All a logical plan. His logic, however, ends there. He then decides that he is the victim and, at least in this article, doesn't seem to show any remorse for his exposing the public that he shared air with in the convienience store. Instead he is angry at the poor treatment he's receiving in jail. I will agree that I don't understand why they took away his TV, computer, etc., when those wouldn't be passed from person to person and would cause no one any harm. But in this case, taking away his personal freedom does seem a reasonable alternative to taking away mine.
posted by Left Coast Sister at 8:00 PM
2 Comments:
Good night. What a bizarre kind of thing--where you're endangering others through being sick.
I heard a little clip of him on NPR. He sounded a little weird to me. The only part that I thought was justified was his complaint that he didn't get an TV, newspapers, etc
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