“Nolite Te Bastardes Carborundorum”
AMANDA
Glasgow, United Kingdom
Day 16
No one is listening to me. I’m starting to think I’m going mad. I’ll send an e-mail and wonder afterward, as it goes unanswered, if I actually sent it. I’m being gaslit by the entire Scottish medical establishment. Gartnavel fired me today, which makes sense. I haven’t been to work in fifteen days. There is absolutely no way I’m prioritizing the health service over my own children. The woman on the phone, some numpty called Karen （of course she was called Karen） said, “You should be ashamed of yourself, abandoning your patients in their time of need.” I asked Karen what she did for a living: she’s an administrator. “What exactly would you know about my patients’ needs?” I hissed, feeling the curious eyes of my children on my back as I moved into a different room and closed the door behind me. “This virus doesn’t respond to treatment, doesn’t respond to antivirals. Nothing makes a difference. I could be the Virgin Mary herself and I wouldn’t be able to save anyone.” Then she hung up.
Well, technically I told her to go fuck herself and then she hung up. Probably to phone some other doctor desperately trying to save his or her family and bully them into coming to work. Will’s just been ignoring the phone calls, which is for the best. He’s a terrible people pleaser. I still sometimes wonder if we’re only married because after three years he was getting a bit nervy about upsetting me if he didn’t propose, rather than because he loved me so much he had to marry me.
I’ve now written to fourteen newspapers around the world. I have sent Health Protection Scotland eight e-mails and called twelve times, not a single one of which has been answered. I’ve e-mailed the WHO in London and Geneva nine times. I. Am. Screaming. Into. The. Void.
The news is showing the descent of Glasgow and Edinburgh into the nightmare of a pandemic. The army has been brought in to drive ambulances, fire engines and trucks carrying food to and from farms and factories and supermarkets. Makes sense when you think about it. Have you ever seen a female truck driver? Dundee and Aberdeen have just announced the closure of schools on Friday, which might be the most laughable public health policy I’ve ever heard of. Yes, that’s a good idea, let’s slow down the spread of this almost-always fatal virus just a wee bit. Give it a long weekend, see if that cheers it up so it won’t kill the Primary One class on Monday.
The people in charge need to listen to me. They are wasting precious time. I’m cooped up in my house with sons whose fear grows by the day as they follow the mushrooming panic of the Plague on Twitter, Facebook, Snapchat, their phones always glowing in their faces. Charlie said yesterday, his thirteen-year-old voice sounding far higher and more like a child’s than it has in years, “Mum, Taylor died.” My first thought was Who’s Taylor? But that wouldn’t have been a helpful response. “He actually died,” Charlie said in wonder before going up to his room, playing unbearably loud music and shouting at me as I came in every ten minutes to “check if you wanted anything to drink” （check if he was trying to kill himself）。
Sometimes being a doctor makes me a worse parent emotionally but a better parent practically, and this is one of those times. I never think, “Oh, he’ll be fine.” In the course of my career I’ve seen over a hundred girls, boys, men, women who’ve killed themselves in minutes, brought to hospital still warm by parents and spouses who never imagined they would kill themselves. The ones who everyone was worried about go straight to the morgue. They tend to plan it better. My sons are alive because I have somehow kept this awful disease out of this house and away from them. But they are starving for my care and affection and I cannot give it to them. I don’t hug them. I don’t cook their food. I don’t go near them if I can possibly help it. I cannot be too careful when their lives are at stake.
Every minute that my e-mails go unanswered is another minute away from a vaccine. This Plague is not just going to flit away into thin air. It’s only going to get worse, and everybody is wasting time. I’m a doctor, not a pathologist. I can’t fix this, but if no one listens to me, then how are we ever going to fix it?