2 weeks Ago
My childhood home was an hour southeast of Pittsburgh, which was, at that time, one of the top steel-producing centers in the industrialized world and a primary target for any war. The U.S.
Department of Defense had surrounded Pittsburgh with Nike missile bases that were supposed to destroy incoming enemy rockets. Now we just protect computer cloud centers. During grade school, our teachers often disrupted the innocence of our childhood by preparing us for the worst.
They had to get us ready for the total devastation of a nuclear holocaust. That is still possible, but no one is preparing for it anymore. The drill was to hide under our desks, then go to the hallway, and cover our heads to protect ourselves from the flying debris.
If you have ever seen the films from the actual hydrogen bomb tests, those wooden desks were not impervious to that first 50-mile-wide fireball that was hotter than the sun. Even if we survived that because Pittsburgh was 52 miles away, that hallway would have instantaneously become ashes. Unfortunately, this was all we had to provide us with some sense of safety and well-being.
As a young paper boy, while walking home from my last customer, I can often remember looking southwest toward the sunset and Pittsburgh and wondering what the fireball and mushroom-shaped cloud would look like when the ultimate attack hit. Of course, we have had many other scares for which we prepared incessantly. Remember Y2K? It was supposed to be the ultimate meltdown of all computers.
The theory was that the programmers forgot to prepare for the 21st century. The computer programs were all for the 1900s. Well, I can tell you that it made plenty of extra money for the computer technicians.
Other than when one of our Y2K team members accidentally leaned against a light switch at midnight on New Year’s Eve, nothing else significant happened anywhere in the world. We can only pray that the current nuclear threats from our enemies, or the next flu pandemic, will have had the proper amount of preparation. If they become a reality, we can only hope that we invested our time wisely.
As far as preparation for the last pandemic was concerned, our country missed the mark on COVID-19 on so many levels. Hindsight being what it was, COVID-19 ended up primarily killing the most vulnerable of us. The overweight, stressed, sedentary, and oldest citizens with chronic conditions were the first to go.
Preparation would not have included the almost complete underfunding and elimination of our public health agencies across the United States or foreign-only production of protective and life-sustaining equipment. It certainly could not have predicted the boatloads of misinformation via the web or the myriad other screw-ups that cost us over a million citizens’ lives. But they did metaphorically recommend hiding under our desks.
There is one thing we can prepare for and that is our own health future through self-care. We can do that by paying attention to whole health and the social determinants of health. This includes diet, exercise, stress management, and social support.
According to physicians like U.S. Surgeon General Vivek H.
Murthy and Dr. Tracy Gaudet, “Whole health is physical, behavioral, spiritual, and socioeconomic well-being as defined by individuals, families, and communities. Whole health care is an inter-professional, team-based approach anchored in trusted relationships to promote well-being, prevent disease, and restore health.
It aligns with a person’s life mission, aspiration, and purpose. It shifts the focus from a reactive, disease-oriented medical care system to one that prioritizes disease prevention, health, and well-being.” It changes the healthcare conversation from “What’s wrong with you?” to “What matters to you?” Because hiding under the desk is not enough anymore.
We may not be able to stop the flu, but we can take better care of ourselves. Nick Jacobs is a Windber resident..
