Tag: pandemic
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The tortoise and the hare: a pandemic perspective
Pranita Rao Pune, India The Tortoise and the Hare. Illustration From The Æsop for Children, by Æsop, illustrated by Milo Winter. Project Gutenberg. “Are you ready to lose again?” smirked the hare, looking down at the tortoise who was warming up for their weekly running challenge. The tortoise spent his days training body and mind to win races against the…
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When I heard the learn’d epidemiologist
Dean Gianakos Lynchburg, Virginia, United States Photo by prottoy hassan on Unsplash Sitting on the maroon recliner in my den, I am having trouble concentrating on the epidemiologist who is talking on the television. He points to a Covid hot zone on a color-coded map of the United States. The screen changes before I can locate Virginia.…
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Regalia
Nancy L. Hagood Charleston, South Carolina, United States Rainbow over Haiti. Photo by Thomas Johnston. My medical school graduation regalia has hung in my closet for two years. It will never be worn. In spring 2019, I was a fourth-year medical student, planning to graduate in May and move 500 miles north to work…
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Applause: Reflections on The Plague and being a doctor in a pandemic
Roger Ruiz Moral Universidad Francisco de Vitoria. Madrid, Spain Quote from the English version of The Plague by Albert Camus in the Library Walk (New York City). Accessed via Wikimedia. Sculpture by Gregg LeFevre. Photo by Heike Huslage-Koch/Lesekreis. “I imagine then what the plague must be for you. Yes, – said Rieux – an endless defeat.”1 The COVID-19 lockdown is today in…
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How a small town kept smallpox small
Annabelle Slingerland Leiden, the Netherlands Fig. 1 Presentation of smallpox. To make a mountain out of a molehill is a vice, but to keep the mole underground is a virtue. The little town of Tilburg in the south of the Netherlands was not accustomed to seeing mountains, but when a molehill first came into…