A brief press conference at Walter Reed Medical Center on Saturday sought to provide answers, but may only have raised more questions about President Trump’s clinical status since his COVID-19 diagnosis. The main point of contention between White…
Category: Infectious disease
The mysterious White House testing scheme that did not protect Trump
President Donald Trump’s COVID-19 diagnosis is raising fresh questions about the White House’s strategy for testing and containing the virus for a president whose cavalier attitude about the coronavirus has persisted since it landed on American shores….
COVID-19 and the college experience
Everyone seems to be walking about in disbelief. College educators and administrators are shocked. Public health officials are incredulous. Politicians are confused, and news reporters are busily shaking their heads at the numbers. Physicians, my colle…
COVID-19 through the eyes of my kids [PODCAST]
“Living the surreal experience of the COVID-19 pandemic challenges us on multiple levels. As a physician, I feel the responsibility to understand the magnitude of the situation and implement the best measures to protect my patients, trainees, my …
Unmasking inequality: the power of community organization during COVID-19
In medical school, I was charged with caring for Ms. R, a 47-year-old woman with type 2 diabetes, hypertension, and rheumatoid arthritis. She had been flagged as a high priority patient through the student-run free clinic (SRFC) and assigned to me for …
Shelter in the age of COVID
“Oh, a storm is threatening My very life today If I don’t get some shelter Ooh yeah, I’m gonna fade away.” -The Rolling Stones Shelter. It’s a safe-sounding word, a comforting word, a good ending to the story word. We have…
This pulmonary physician has a message for you [PODCAST]
“To the people who say that wearing a mask perpetuates the conspiracy: Tell that to the health care workers who have put their lives at risk to face firsthand an unknown disease. Tell that to the families of frontline workers who have contracted …
A patient’s plea: I don’t know who to put my trust in
Do you wake up these days thinking that you’ve been whisked off your feet by some strange force and dropped in some unidentifiable place, similar to what happened to Dorothy and Toto in the Wizard of Oz? For the two of them, there was a happy en…
When an epidemic of violence against health care workers meets a pandemic
“Sir, please calm down,” she says nervously, glancing around to see if anyone had noticed their interaction. “No, I will not calm down. Where is your boss? You don’t know what you are doing!” He gets up and starts walking …
The children of COVID
If you ignore the masks, the missing exam room toys, and the “astronaut doctor” PAPR on my head, you might think it was a regular day in my pediatric office. But it’s not. It’s a day where we are still all trying to push through the thickness in the ai…
