Rita Panahi: How virus fears are killing perspective and compassion
Ben Stylo’s distressed parents have begged for their son - gravely ill in a Melbourne ICU ward - to be allowed just one visitor. But because of draconian COVID rules he is suffering alone and they are left to endure a heartbreaking ordeal. What has happened to our shared humanity, writes Rita Panahi.
Rita Panahi
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There is something terribly wrong with our shared humanity if we can justify keeping parents from seeing their critically ill child in the interests of public safety.
Or if, as a community, we can justify using powerful drugs to sedate those in aged care who are infected with coronavirus but suffering no symptoms.
Or if we can justify, and even applaud, police manhandling a young woman for not wearing a mask, despite the fact that she had a legitimate medical reason.
Worse still, many Victorians are not just reluctantly accepting incursions on their liberties, they’re cheering on each draconian measure no matter how harmful or illogical.
It’s as if a vast portion of the population has suspended judgment, and instead embraced blind adherence to authority no matter the cost.
One fears that Victoria’s moral compass is broken.
How else can you explain the inhumane decision to keep a mother from her desperately ill son who has twice come close to dying in ICU?
Ben Stylo’s distressed parents have begged for their son to be allowed just one visitor.
They have offered to be tested regularly, pay for their own PPE gear and do whatever else is necessary for their son to have the comfort of a loved one by his side as he fights for his life after suffering septic shock.
Why are authorities inflicting further pain on people who are already facing a heartbreaking ordeal?
How can a civilised society act so cruelly and convince itself that the cruelty is justified?
And, as a society, what exactly are we protecting by banning a mother from seeing her grimly ill son?
This isn’t protection, it is debasement.
Ben’s mum, Rose Cassar, has called on Premier Dan Andrews and Chief Health Officer Brett Sutton to reconsider restrictions on hospital visitors during the COVID-19 pandemic.
“We think every family should have the right to see their family members in ICU and it’s been 10 days now,” she said.
“It’s inhumane. I’m literally going mad, I’m losing my mind over this, trying to think of ways to get in there to see him.”
The family has started a petition calling for hospital visitation rules to be changed.
They want to see Ben when he is alive and conscious.
Their plight is not an isolated one.
There are gravely ill people in hospitals throughout Melbourne yearning to see family members.
Then there are those in aged care who are not allowed visitors except in the most limited circumstances such as “end of life”.
This week we learned that some residents infected with COVID-19 in aged-care facilities in Victoria, including younger residents in their 40s, are being heavily sedated to stop them “wandering” and infecting others.
A practice that many, including medical experts, consider “inhumane”.
Physician and Monash University academic Joseph Ibrahim has warned that sedating patients who have coronavirus is not only cruel but dangerous and could lead to an early death.
The Australian has reported that Victoria’s Department of Health and Human Services has refused to admit COVID-19 patients to hospital, leaving them in under-resourced, understaffed nursing homes.
As a first-world country, we should do better.
The median age for coronavirus deaths in Australia is 84.
Those in aged care are not expendable, they are precisely the population that should be protected.
But from the start of this pandemic, the focus in Victoria has been on policing the healthy majority while neglecting the key areas needing the greatest attention, such as returned travellers in hotel quarantine and high-risk residents in nursing homes.
We have long gone past the point where the cure is worse than the disease.
Millions have been condemned to living on welfare, with restrictions causing catastrophic economic, social and medical consequences.
The disproportionate response isn’t restricted to Victoria, though Dan Andrews government’s ineptness stands alone in the country as a model of what not to do in a crisis.
The Prime Minister and National Cabinet have to this day not explained the long-term plan of how we will live with this virus until a “silver bullet” vaccine is developed, if it ever is.
As I wrote in May, Australia should be emulating Taiwan, not New Zealand, in framing its coronavirus response — otherwise we can look forward to more deaths plus economic devastation and long-term isolation.
Times of disaster can bring people together or tear them apart.
A scared populace is a submissive one but it can also be an uncharitable one that can justify cruelty in the name of the greater good.
It’s clear that a great many Victorians are scared witless and it’s showing in how little empathy they have for their fellow man.
IN SHORT:New Zealand was applauded for “eliminating community transmission” of COVID-19 but the premature adulation was based on faulty data. It’s clear that despite the severe measures employed, the virus has lingered and on Thursday another 13 new cases were reported. Lockdowns don’t eradicate viruses.
Rita Panahi is a Herald Sun columnist