COVID-19 gives all of us pause when it comes to thinking about our future. When this is done, we should not return to a world as we knew it, but instead make needed changes--the kinds of changes that would have supported our efforts better with this virus. What should we do?
Take illness seriously
If nothing else, this virus has taught us to take illness seriously. Those who called the virus a hoax, did not readily share information about the virus, and did not act against the virus in good time, lost precious time when it came to mitigating this pandemic. We have to update our national, state, local, and personal response to illness--to be ready, is to better deal with grave illnesses like this and to save lives.
Update health care and support
Most Americans know that it's time to update health care to make sure that everyone in our country is as healthy as possible. Most of us know how difficult it is to access health care--it's difficult to find doctors, it's difficult to make appointments, it's difficult to pay for those appointments, and it's often difficult to follow-up with medical care instructions. We need to make the health care system easier to access, more efficient, and better prepared to care for all of us. How will we do this?
I'm not a medical expert, but some ideas that I think will help include the following:
Take illness seriously
If nothing else, this virus has taught us to take illness seriously. Those who called the virus a hoax, did not readily share information about the virus, and did not act against the virus in good time, lost precious time when it came to mitigating this pandemic. We have to update our national, state, local, and personal response to illness--to be ready, is to better deal with grave illnesses like this and to save lives.
Update health care and support
Most Americans know that it's time to update health care to make sure that everyone in our country is as healthy as possible. Most of us know how difficult it is to access health care--it's difficult to find doctors, it's difficult to make appointments, it's difficult to pay for those appointments, and it's often difficult to follow-up with medical care instructions. We need to make the health care system easier to access, more efficient, and better prepared to care for all of us. How will we do this?
I'm not a medical expert, but some ideas that I think will help include the following:
- create easy-to-access multi-service health campuses in every community
- create national health care that gives everyone easy and affordable access to needed health care
- make sure that every community has the PPEs and other equipment that makes them ready for a illnesses that may spread and put lives at risk
- educate more doctors, nurses, and other medical staff--I have always felt that we educate too few medical professionals in the United States
Strengthen communities
The long food lines and inequity with regard to who the groups this virus is killing most demonstrates weakness in our communities. There are many ways that we can strengthen all communities so that when grave challenges like this virus strike, communities are ready to help one another and stay afloat. What can we do?
- Support fair pay and benefits for all Americans. Many in the United States don't make enough money to live good lives. We have to change that.
- Rethink child and family support agencies. Schools are not set up to fully protect children, instead we need full-service child care agencies and institutions that serve children and their families. We need to bring together social service agencies, schools, and health agencies to make sure that all families and children have what they need to live healthy lives.
- Rethink food systems--how can we make sure that everyone has sufficient healthy food?
- Rethink how to make healthy communities. Efforts such as sensible gun laws, eliminating excessive pollution, clean water legislation, creation of healthy recreation areas, and developing good, positive, strong culture will make us better ready to combat the challenges we face today and challenges we'll face in the future.
- Educate all in the community regularly and well--look at all segments of a community and think about the ways that people can be better educated. An educated populous is generally more peaceful and ready to successfully meet challenges.
- Deal with immigration in humane, win-win ways that give people healthy, positive paths towards citizenship and good living. Make it impossible for businesses, families, and individuals to profit off the baks of undocumented workers.
If we move on from this virus with the awareness that all illness has to be taken seriously, modern, accessible, smart health care systems matter, and we al benefit when communities are strong, we will create a better society. We can do this.