editted with more thoughts
I have seen almost 0 coverage of changes to behavioral healthcare and social services in the midst of this pandemic. Please share any articles if you find any.
While numbers of beds in NYC for individuals dealing with COVID-19 have increased due to the creation of temporary hospitals, I wonder where the other beds are taken from. I know that entire inpatient psychiatry units are closing, and this conflict on having to choose what to prioritize reveals the horror of what is happening (and has been happening even prior to the pandemic).
Behavioral health clinicians in hospitals are also supposedly being moved around to other places, and I wonder what is happening to the people they serve. Social service/community mental health providers are scrambling to adapt to changes in service delivery models.
How do we provide the best care to the most oppressed when there's no transparency or central message about what's going on?
When access to smart phones, computers, and internet are issues?
When unemployment websites crash and families can't apply for food stamps easily?
When pre-existing racism and classism have intensified?
When we don't know which hospitals to safely direct people to for psychiatric emergencies?
When even some labs, pharmacies, and PCPs have also closed?
When frontline healthcare workers and affiliates are intentionally sacrificed?
When we have to rely on donations for basic protective equiptment like masks when donations have never been the real answer to a lot of things?
When people are living at home with their abusers or do not have homes to "stay at home" for but shelters are not the best places?
When the people living in poverty or with pre-existing health conditions are deciding to make deliveries/stock groceries rather than stay at home because staying at home was actually never an option for them?
When shame and stigma about receiving help prevent people who now need it from getting it?
When the system has always been about deciding who is worthy or not?
Different forms of oppression exist because they are systematically promoted (even if unintentionally), and if systematic and intentional actions happen, those forms of oppression can be addressed on multiple levels.
The next time someone says that “the system” and people in power cannot make drastic changes overnight to try to overcome an identified problem that harms the public welfare because it’ll impact too many other parts of life, think about what is happening now. Sweeping changes are happening for one mutual cause, and despite all the suffering, it's nice to see how much care and empathy have been portrayed in different communities. I just wish it did not take a pandemic for policies, attitudes, and intentions to shift.
The gaps that have existed since our nation's founding between the privileged and the oppressed are being intensified, and I hope that after the numbers of cases and deaths decrease, even if mutual benefits are not immediately realized, people can showcase solidarity and protect one another from poverty, racism, and sexism, among other issues.