A few days ago I held the COVID-19 “pager” for my hospital. I couldn’t keep up. For every call I answered, 3 more showed up. In my 21 years as a physician there have been quick emergencies during which I couldn’t keep up with calls. But nothing close to this.

As our hospital, which serves over a million people in Vermont and surrounding states, gets reads for COVID-19 to hit hard, I’ve worked incredible hard, and been inspired every day. The way our hospital and our entire health network works has been entirely changed. Whole hospital floors retooled. Thousands of elective surgeries cancelled. Buildings commandeered. Entire clinical processes and teams fully made a new over and again.

I direct our ethics program, and a cascade of questions have kept me busy. If we run out of hospital beds or PPE or mechanical ventilator, how should we apportion them wisely? Should we resuscitate someone with COVID-19 even if it could infect their caregivers and the next patients those caregivers see? Should we save the lives of children over older adults? Is it ethical to consider disability in resource allocation schemes?

Even as we address hard ethical and scientific questions, one of the biggest challenges of the COVID-19 epidemic has been getting trustable information out to the general public. Questions abound, from should I stay home (yes), to should I get tested (not if you are stable), to should I take hydroxychloroquine (probably not) . Oh, yeah, and is the grocery store totally safe? (No, but nowhere is).

Here is one example of a PSA put out through the magic of our hardworking communications team. I hope you like it. More to follow, and today I’m going to try my first Facebook live Q&A about the novel coronavirus to see if that is helpful.

Life in the time of COVID