I saw an elderly man, blue plaid shirt, his hair a white cloud around his head, standing outside an emergency department, his hand on the window, watching his wife, frail, coughing, waiting for masked healthcare workers to take her through triage. He saw me dressed in black scrubs, mask, goggles — and assumed I was someone who knew.

“Is this the last time I’ll see her?”

I hugged my mom and dad. I hadn’t seen them in months because of the pandemic. But now, as case counts dropped, it became safe enough to allow gatherings big enough to include me, my kids and my parents. Hugging them was clumsy, all elbows and chins.

We had forgotten how to hug, it seemed. But my heart lifted all the same. 

The cost of this pandemic can’t just be measured in illnesses, ICU beds and deaths, economic recession and job losses, in overwhelmed health systems and burned out front-line workers. There has been a human toll that we’ve only just begun to realize.

Mental illness has spiked. Isolated, afraid, faced with an uncertain present and an uncertain future, many struggle with new-onset depression and/or anxiety. The incidence of domestic violence has increased. Parents are frustrated juggling home-schooling with working from home. Teenagers, whose identity and development is shaped by their social circles, stare at silent walls in their bedrooms. Loneliness has shot through the roof as people are forcibly separated from their usual social supports. Caregivers and families are left unable to help, watching as their loved ones have gotten sick, sicker or even died. Alone. Apart.

Similarly, my patient watched through the window of the nursing home: her husband, short of breath from a COPD exacerbation, weakened from dementia, unable to understand why she could no longer be by his side when she had been there every day for 63 years.

As we work to get our lives in order, our healthcare system and economy up and going, we can’t forget the human toll of this pandemic. A second wave will likely hit our shores this Fall. We have a window of opportunity here to consider how, armed with knowledge and experience, we can and must do better the next go-around.

(First published in The Independent Free Press on July 2, 2020)