Healing Hospitals – Nick Jacobs, FACHE

Healing Environments, Innovation and Health Leadership

An Answer to the Question, “How are you doing?”

August 25th, 2021 by Nick Jacobs Leave a reply »

Hey Rox,

I’m doing okay now, thanks.

I’m just bored with COVID restrictions brought on this time by the recalcitrant warriors of the uninformed. With 20+ years of experience working with RNA specialists, I’m totally dispirited that social media and politics have homogenized to form some type of perverse love-match to place us in this Ground Hog Day-type circular firing squad again created by massive conspiracy theories about mRNA and tracking devices.

I anxiously watched my six-year-old grandson get on the bus to head to an “It’s up to you if you want your kid to wear a mask” school district, and I pray he doesn’t become a pediatric statistic in one of the hospitals that is totally understaffed, overworked, and psychologically drained.

Then I got a call from my kid that someone else in the office who chose to avoid the “satanic vaccine” is infected with COVID and that may mean going into quarantine.

It’s like re-living the political and racial turmoil of 1968 capped with the fear of the Black Plague of 1346, topped by the Afghan situation with the Taliban’s religious beliefs of the 7th Century.

We may have smart phones containing access to all of the knowledge ever accumulated in human history but our tribal instincts and irrational thinking are reminiscent of an evening of chair throwing at a WWE fight combined with a fiery day at NASCAR, all wrapped up in the garbage left behind at a Pittsburgh Heinz Field, Kenny Chesney concert.

I love the James Baldwin quote, “I imagine one of the reasons people cling to their hates so stubbornly is because they sense, once hate is gone, they will be forced to deal with pain.”

Wow, I guess that was a long answer to a short question. No need to reply. Sometimes it’s good to be older!

Take care,

Nick