April 14, 2020
The Long Haul
Day 26
Seniors are scared!
Nursing homes are now high-priced warehouses where old people go to die.
Assisted-living facilities are a target-rich environment for the coronavirus.
No-one will choose to move to either ever again.
These harsh thoughts are real and suddenly front-and-center for the frightened, grey-haired, social-security set. Covid-19 has been discovered in at least 2,300 nursing homes across 37 states. More than 2,000 have died.
The real number of cases and deaths is much higher. The National Health Service in Great Britain reported a week ago that the nation’s Covid-19 statistics might be 15 percent higher than the official figures because of unreported cases and mislabelled deaths in nursing homes.
Older Americans are not waiting for the economy to restart. Of course, we care about restaurants reopening and getting people back to work but mostly seniors are waiting and wondering if they will ever be safe again.
Safe means living, playing with grandchildren and dying from normal stuff, like cancer, heart disease or along a guardrail after a mistimed-left turn on I-95! No senior ever imagined they would move somewhere to be safe and die because of it.
After a month of listening to breathless newscasters and politicians soberly discuss the pandemic many seniors are numbed by all the chatter. They have developed an immunity to the horrifying statistics but unfortunately not the coronavirus itself.
That immunity is pierced however by reports much closer to home.
By now everyone has a story to tell. In an earlier post I wrote about my wife’s 98-year-old uncle living in a high-end, assisted-living facility on Long Island where six-residents died before anyone knew Covid-19 was the hidden killer. Thankfully he remains virus free.
My wife’s 91-year old aunt, living at an assisted-living facility in Cambridge, was not so lucky. She tested positive for Covid-19 last week and is isolated and taking meals alone in her small apartment. For now she is asymptomatic. Many seniors are lonely; isolation is its own kind of killer.
Everyone in her Massachusetts senior living facility was tested last week, about 25 of 80 residents, most in their 70s , 80s and 90s came back positive. A quick google search revealed there was no mention of this nursing home anywhere in the Boston news media. Who knows if these cases are reflected in the official statistics!
My son in Brooklyn lives in Crown Heights on the same block where the New York Times reported this week that six residents of a drab-looking nursing home, squeezed between residential row houses, had died from the virus.
It is not possible to be numb to these statistics. They are too real, too close to home.
My 76-year-old Southern California sister is sheltering-in-place with her husband in their home of the last 50 years. They are comfortable, if isolated there. Like many seniors they use a shopper for groceries and Amazon for everything else. For emergencies, like plumbing that waited for a pandemic to fail, they reluctantly accepted help from their adult children.
This was not how old age was supposed to be. Recently my sister mused:
“We have been paying for long-term care insurance since we were in our 50s, thinking there would be a time when we could not live on our own. Now I will never go to assisted living or a nursing home.”
My sister and more specifically her amazing husband have been smart investors and planned carefully. I have known for years that they had long-term-care insurance and if I am honest, have been jealous.
Not any more!
To be fair, nursing homes and assisted-living facilities are doing what they can, fighting a war no-one outside the infectious-disease world every imagined would come. Friends sheltering-in-place and living independently in a facility outside Burlington reported recently no-one among the residents and the staff had tested positive. This is good news and all the more amazing, my friend reports, because more than 100 staff members rotate in and out of the complex every day.
We are fortunate, grateful that we are healthy and at home on our farm. We plan to stay isolated until the scientists and medical professionals assure us it is safe to reenter the world.
My adult children complain that many of my blog posts are too dark. Faithful readers, they will undoubtedly put this one in the dark category, perhaps even the darkest. While I confess to having occasional bouts of melancholy, my glass is more often than not half full, not half empty.
This blog reflects a grim reality as I see it today. Reality is what I am hoping to report here.
Our personal reality is filled with hope and renewal.
Our grandchildren race down the hills for homeschooling and piano lessons three days a week. We see them everyday.
Our sheep were shorn and wormed a week ago; social distancing guidelines rigorously followed throughout the process. We will be lambing soon; there could be as many as 10 frenetic, fluff balls roaming out pastures by early May.
Baby chicks and turkeys will arrive through the mail in early May and piglets should show up shortly thereafter.
Seedlings are spouting under lights upstairs, the asparus and garlic have been uncovered in our many gardens and rhubarb will be ready in less than two-weeks. The sun is shining today; the snow may finally be going away
Life will be better tomorrow than today.
Be safe!
The Long Haul
Day 26
Seniors are scared!
Nursing homes are now high-priced warehouses where old people go to die.
Assisted-living facilities are a target-rich environment for the coronavirus.
No-one will choose to move to either ever again.
These harsh thoughts are real and suddenly front-and-center for the frightened, grey-haired, social-security set. Covid-19 has been discovered in at least 2,300 nursing homes across 37 states. More than 2,000 have died.
The real number of cases and deaths is much higher. The National Health Service in Great Britain reported a week ago that the nation’s Covid-19 statistics might be 15 percent higher than the official figures because of unreported cases and mislabelled deaths in nursing homes.
Older Americans are not waiting for the economy to restart. Of course, we care about restaurants reopening and getting people back to work but mostly seniors are waiting and wondering if they will ever be safe again.
Safe means living, playing with grandchildren and dying from normal stuff, like cancer, heart disease or along a guardrail after a mistimed-left turn on I-95! No senior ever imagined they would move somewhere to be safe and die because of it.
After a month of listening to breathless newscasters and politicians soberly discuss the pandemic many seniors are numbed by all the chatter. They have developed an immunity to the horrifying statistics but unfortunately not the coronavirus itself.
That immunity is pierced however by reports much closer to home.
By now everyone has a story to tell. In an earlier post I wrote about my wife’s 98-year-old uncle living in a high-end, assisted-living facility on Long Island where six-residents died before anyone knew Covid-19 was the hidden killer. Thankfully he remains virus free.
My wife’s 91-year old aunt, living at an assisted-living facility in Cambridge, was not so lucky. She tested positive for Covid-19 last week and is isolated and taking meals alone in her small apartment. For now she is asymptomatic. Many seniors are lonely; isolation is its own kind of killer.
Everyone in her Massachusetts senior living facility was tested last week, about 25 of 80 residents, most in their 70s , 80s and 90s came back positive. A quick google search revealed there was no mention of this nursing home anywhere in the Boston news media. Who knows if these cases are reflected in the official statistics!
My son in Brooklyn lives in Crown Heights on the same block where the New York Times reported this week that six residents of a drab-looking nursing home, squeezed between residential row houses, had died from the virus.
It is not possible to be numb to these statistics. They are too real, too close to home.
My 76-year-old Southern California sister is sheltering-in-place with her husband in their home of the last 50 years. They are comfortable, if isolated there. Like many seniors they use a shopper for groceries and Amazon for everything else. For emergencies, like plumbing that waited for a pandemic to fail, they reluctantly accepted help from their adult children.
This was not how old age was supposed to be. Recently my sister mused:
“We have been paying for long-term care insurance since we were in our 50s, thinking there would be a time when we could not live on our own. Now I will never go to assisted living or a nursing home.”
My sister and more specifically her amazing husband have been smart investors and planned carefully. I have known for years that they had long-term-care insurance and if I am honest, have been jealous.
Not any more!
To be fair, nursing homes and assisted-living facilities are doing what they can, fighting a war no-one outside the infectious-disease world every imagined would come. Friends sheltering-in-place and living independently in a facility outside Burlington reported recently no-one among the residents and the staff had tested positive. This is good news and all the more amazing, my friend reports, because more than 100 staff members rotate in and out of the complex every day.
We are fortunate, grateful that we are healthy and at home on our farm. We plan to stay isolated until the scientists and medical professionals assure us it is safe to reenter the world.
My adult children complain that many of my blog posts are too dark. Faithful readers, they will undoubtedly put this one in the dark category, perhaps even the darkest. While I confess to having occasional bouts of melancholy, my glass is more often than not half full, not half empty.
This blog reflects a grim reality as I see it today. Reality is what I am hoping to report here.
Our personal reality is filled with hope and renewal.
Our grandchildren race down the hills for homeschooling and piano lessons three days a week. We see them everyday.
Our sheep were shorn and wormed a week ago; social distancing guidelines rigorously followed throughout the process. We will be lambing soon; there could be as many as 10 frenetic, fluff balls roaming out pastures by early May.
Baby chicks and turkeys will arrive through the mail in early May and piglets should show up shortly thereafter.
Seedlings are spouting under lights upstairs, the asparus and garlic have been uncovered in our many gardens and rhubarb will be ready in less than two-weeks. The sun is shining today; the snow may finally be going away
Life will be better tomorrow than today.
Be safe!
I can see the Oak Hill Health Center (a nursing home), a block away, from my bedroom window. At least ten people have died there. It looks like a big cement casket and must feel like that from the inside. So sad.
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