Sunday, October 19, 2014

Nurses, Ebola, and Manly-Men in Government


Mack Hall, HSG


 

Nurses: ThenSpeak / NowSpeak

 

ThenSpeak: Nurses are honored for risking their lives to heal the sick and wounded.

NowSpeak: She got sick? Must have been her own fault. Punish her.  If she survives.

 

ThenSpeak: When a man sees a nurse, he tips his hat respectfully.

NowSpeak:  When a man sees a nurse, he demands that she not take a trip, shop for groceries, take public transportation, or go anywhere except to work without asking his permission.

 

ThenSpeak: The wise physician always listens to the nurse.

NowSpeak: The wise physician still does.

 

ThenSpeak: Nurses are women.

NowSpeak: Men, many of them combat medics, are nurses too.

 

ThenSpeak: Three-year hospital schools produce generations of professional, well educated registered nurses.

NowSpeak: two-year colleges and four-year universities produce generations of professional and even better educated registered nurses.  In addition, many nurses accomplish master’s degrees and doctorates.

 

ThenSpeak: Nurses are on duty every hour of the day and night.

NowSpeak:  Nurses are still on duty every hour of the day and night.  So what are the staff of the Center for Disease Control doing at 0230 when the sleet is hitting the landing pad, the lights have failed, and the dust-off is yawing in against the wind with wounded aboard?

 

ThenSpeak: Nurses keep up with medical developments through in-service and professional journals; we should listen to them.

NowSpeak: Hey, forget them; we can cure diseases by throwing buckets of water over our heads and wearing little ceramic pins made in China.

 

ThenSpeak:  Nurses often make do with inadequate supplies.

NowSpeak: The CDC budget for 2012 was $7.16 billion (Huffington Post), and nurses still must make do with inadequate supplies.

 

ThenSpeak: Long hours, many demands, low pay.

NowSpeak: Long hours, many demands, low pay, and now under the rule of an Ebola Czar who kinda looks like a frat-boy version of Kim Jong Un and whose only medical qualification is being a pal to the vice-president.  One wonders what his hours, work, and pay are like.

 

ThenSpeak: Nurses are angels in white.

NowSpeak: Nurses are angels in white, in scrubs, in helicopter jumpsuits, and in combat body armor.  They are angels aboard warships, in field units in far-off WhoseDumbIdeaWasThisIstan, on long-distance evacuation aircraft, in foreign and domestic missions, and in great hospitals and in tiny rural clinics.  Nurses have suffered and died in POW camps and have been murdered by their captors.  Nurses are the immediate responders when some poor soul who is hemorrhaging, crying, puking, coughing, screaming, and gasping, possibly drunk or stoned or armed, is pushed through the emergency room door,.

 

So maybe the manly men in Washington and Austin are blaming nurses because the manly men aren’t doing their own jobs.

 

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