This is probably an unpopular opinion – but doctors and nurses are getting too much attention and credit right now. I imagine if I had continued to pursue a career in medicine, this atmosphere wouldn’t make me thrilled.
Look, I’m not at all surprised by all the adulation being heaped on medical personnel. There’s a threat of a virus which has raised the general fear level quite a bit. So there is a natural inclination to think, these people are saving our lives, we need to reward them. It is true, doctors and nurses provide a valuable service as a part of a functioning society. My life has most likely been saved at least a couple times, or at least kept me from some serious long-term debilitating injury. However, As a side note, isn’t it amazing how doctors have essentially green-lit a level of recklessness from the general public that a hundred years ago would have left huge swaths of the population severely handicapped?
There are many types of doctors and they don’t all deal with disease. All this praise that I see for doctors and nurses, even for some grocery store workers as being on the “front-lines”. Rewarding them with various things like “free meals”. All that love that is all over the air-waves and internet seems a bit much to me. They are already rewarded in terms of pay, but it’s not just that. For a society to function, all jobs are interconnected and essential.
This PDA that seems to be everywhere, “we love our doctors and nurses!” It’s a nice sentiment, but it’s actually pretty superficial – and that’s what bothers me. So many people in so many walks-of-life actually do a lot more for our health and simultaneously are nearly invisible to most of us. Let’s just start with this virus, what about the researchers working on the cure? Where’s the, “We love our researchers!”? Or what about those who have provided previous cures, vaccines, antibiotics, etc.? What about the vendors and workers providing the materials and machines for hospitals, researchers and pharma?
If we step a bit further back than just medicine related, what about the various farmers feeding ALL of us? Remember, if the food stops, then truly huge numbers of people WILL die. How about the slaughter house or butcher? Jobs that are on their own front-lines when it comes to disease and delivering product to us that is safe for consumption. How about city sanitation workers that are on the front-lines everyday. They deal with bio-hazard on a daily basis, they risk their lives entering man holes to fix problems so our toilets continue to flush. In fact, I would argue, nothing has done more to save more lives than public sanitation. How about those that provide our power or gas? Can you imagine your life without power or instant heat? What about those that make the clothes that protect us from the elements? What about those that make the machines that clean those clothes and absolutely help keep us healthy? Or the machines to keep and cook our food? Or those that provide space so we can purchase those items?
I could really go on and on and on. Job after job after job that makes our society function, keeps us safe, keeps us healthy, and keeps us connected. Many people risk their lives everyday, working in all sorts of different ways to provide for both our families and theirs. Not all of those jobs are high paying either. They don’t have much glamor, if any, but they are absolutely essential to our survival. I understand why doctors and nurses get a lot of praise – they are highly visible and deliver a personal one-on-one service. But we should all be even more grateful to the many, many more who have raised our standard of living and overall life expectancy doing those non-glamorous jobs.
If you really look up and down the labor chains in our society, there really aren’t that many “non-essential” jobs. I just hope when we look at our doctors and nurses, we also see that network of people that holds them up and supports them and keeps them alive both professionally and personally and makes it possible for them to do what they do, so we can do what we do, so they can do what they do and on and on.
