COVID and us

• By Dave McCreery
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We all expect life to throw us curveballs. Better if I say, we accept when life throws them.

Sometime we roll with the punch; other times we grind our teeth (you can ask my dentist); then there are the times we find ourselves on the anger spectrum, ranging from irritation to losing it. Eventually, we buckle down and work our way out of it. Time heals all.

Then, along comes the mother of all curveballs: COVID-19. However, this is no curveball. This one is a proverbial screwball. What? A pandemic. Those happen in the forgetful movies we watch a 3:00AM when we constantly wonder why we are still up.

Nope. This is the real thing.

I work for an academic medical school. My responsibility is to raise funds to support and advance the highest needs and priorities of physicians and scientists. I meet with these faculty members to understand their issues and how they would use philanthropic funding to address them.

I wish you could hear the challenges, concern, brilliance, creativity, collaboration, commitment and downright fear which come from these professionals as they talk about COVID and their work to find solutions. I know some people doubt the entire coronavirus situation. Not me.

I straddle the world of understanding this issue. On one hand, I see it from my favorite rocking chair while watching the news or reading the news. On the other hand, I listen intently to these research physicians.

We have no clue how fortunate we are to have literally thousands of the best researchers in the world trying to solve this dilemma. I am amazed at the level of collaboration taking place. They have dispensed with receiving credit. They are dedicated to finding answers.

I believe they will. I also believe we can wear a mask and possibly save someone’s life, including our own. Such little to ask of us to deal with such a killer curveball.