Donna Schimming: Community rights change in crisis when it comes to public health

To The Daily Sun,

I finished reading Ms. Lynn Chong's letter about anti-vaxxers using up our hospital's resources and I applaud her sentiment. She expressed what I have been feeling all along. Their stubborn refusal is imperiling every community. In case you haven't noticed, acquiring a doctor's appointment is becoming as rare as the dodo.

I have personal experience with this scenario. I began feeling chest pain in my mid sternum, I knew it wasn't a myocardial infarction, but I wasn't sure if it was angina. I did what I rarely do; went to the emergency room at Concord Hospital — Laconia. This was possibly a cardiac issue, I was seen "early" for an EKG — non remarkable. So over the course of eight hours I received a chest x-ray, blood work, physician exam, etc. The reason? The ER was backed up with admissions because there wasn't enough staff, at 8:45 a.m. Translate to: the ER became the holding cell for them. Translate to: anyone arriving at the ER for anything not urgent would do well to go home and call their physician, if they can get an appointment. The hospital staff were overwhelmed because of anti-vaxxers and lack of personnel. The anti-vaxxers were confirmed by the medical staff I spoke with. They were fed up, exhausted and overwhelmed with COVID patients; none of which had been vaccinated. If there isn't some abatement to this, medical personnel are going to quit, with deadly repercussions eventually if not already.

I read the criticisms of Lynn's letter and there is still an undercurrent of "their rights." Who said so? I was under the apparently deluded notion that in a crisis whatever your perceived rights are go out the window in the name of public health. Seems I misunderstood. Or is it still the same old "you can't tell me what to do" mentality?

At many hospitals, why are all beds allotted for COVID? Shouldn't some be allotted specifically for other people's critical care? Just because COVID is raging doesn't diminish the other threats. Cancer treatment, heart attacks and traumatic accidents all need medical expertise.

Am I alone in believing that it is well past the time people should stop believing that it is a hoax, that masks and vaccines don't work?

To those critics of Lynn's speaking up, the crisis at Concord Hospital — Laconia is here. There were no more beds for admission, so those unfortunates were transferred to hospitals in Connecticut. Is this the future of health care in communities like ours?

Something should be done about those whose behaviors cause a drain on the resources meant for all of us. Smokers should pay more in health premiums, morbidly obese should as well. Why should we pay the same because of their weakness?

I too am a health professional, worked in three hospitals, two clinics and was a volunteer first responder for three years. So I, too, know a "bit" about the medical industry. Get off your high horse unless you want to visit someone you care about in Connecticut, or Rhode Island.

Donna Schimming

Sanbornton