Wecht: Virus has amplified nation’s divide
The COVID-19 pandemic has exacerbated the already “very disturbing” ideological split between America’s left and right wings, a divide that’s shaping the government’s response and fueling hysteria, renowned forensic pathologist Dr. Cyril Wecht said Saturday.
Dr. Wecht, who was Allegheny County’s coroner and medical examiner for more than two decades and who recently urged a lifting of governmental restrictions on the American people, said in a wide-ranging interview with the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette that he believes if the pandemic were to have occurred in a nonelection year, there wouldn’t be as much pandemonium.
A self-proclaimed lifelong Democrat and a former chair of the Allegheny County Democratic Party, Dr. Wecht said some members of his party have made the political calculation that the more they criticize President Donald Trump, the better it’s going to be for them at the ballot box in November — even though those criticisms, he said, are “quite justified” and rightly point out the president’s failures and “absurd statements and conflicts with people.”
“I repeat, I’m saying this as a Democrat,” Dr. Wecht said, noting that if Democrats were to follow the president’s calls to swiftly reopen the country, their arguments about the quality of his administration’s response would be diminished, if not completely erased.
Dr. Wecht’s statements underscore his recent warnings of the societal, economic and psychological consequences of the government’s patchwork of shutdowns and quarantines — a response that he’s deemed disproportionate to the severity of the virus.
It’s not sustainable, Dr. Wecht has said, to upend the foundations of American society over a disease with a mortality rate of less than 1% — and one he says could be sufficiently managed with a precise focus on groups that are most susceptible.
When history looks back, Dr. Wecht said, it’ll show the U.S. acted in an “overly restrictive fashion” and cultivated a significant degree of panic and hysteria, damaging many lives — some permanently.
High school seniors and college students — including some in his family — are missing their graduation ceremonies and are uncertain about their futures, Dr. Wecht noted. Families are holding conversations 10 feet apart. Women and children are stuck in homes with abusive men. Big court cases are on hold, suicides are on the rise and nursing home patients with other serious ailments aren’t receiving the care they need, he said.
And economically, it is the Americans who have lost jobs, make the minimum wage and are waiting in line at food banks who are paying the highest price, Dr. Wecht said — a burden not shared equally by those who still have jobs, can work from the comfort of their homes and have families who can support them financially.
“We cannot, should not and do not have the right to destroy lives — or to damage them,” Dr. Wecht said.
Dr. Wecht urged a “careful” reopening that’s wellplanned and gives people control over how they want to protect themselves. Retail stores should reopen, classes should start back up and people should wear masks or remain isolated if they choose — and for those who don’t want to, they shouldn’t be ostracized, he said.
The government can’t “destroy the lives of other people who are willing to take the chance,” Dr. Wecht insisted, re-upping his calls for the continued monitoring and treatment of those who are most susceptible.
Dr. Wecht said he approaches the issue from the perspective of a doctor, a pathologist, an attorney, a member of society and the grandfather of someone who had COVID-19 — and as a professional who lived and worked during the spread of many deadly diseases that didn’t make society “go crazy.”
Asked about public opinion polls that show support for shutdowns and stay-athome orders, Dr. Wecht said they’re understandable because people believe the restrictions have saved many lives — but as people reflect, they’ll change their mind.
He also said if pollsters would survey people from worse-off socioeconomic backgrounds, they’d find many who are willing to take the risk and return to work — compared to those who make more than $100,000 a year, for example.
“I would be willing to bet a vast, vast difference” in the results, Dr. Wecht said.
Dr. Cyril Wecht urged a “careful” reopening that’s well-planned and that gives people control over how they want to protect themselves.
Political opinions
Dr. Wecht noted the vast difference in political opinions surrounding the pandemic, and said it’s reached a point where “Trump Republicans” want to lift everything overnight and “left-wing Democrats” want to keep the restrictions in place with no end in sight. Instead, it should be a discussion of medicine, science and public health, he said.
He said he admires what some other Democratic governors are doing: showing “courage” in bucking their own party’s central messaging and easing up some of the restrictions on their own.
Dr. Wecht doesn’t consider Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Wolf to be one of those governors, and said the governor is continuing to impose restrictions in many areas.
“I think he’s moving in the right direction and I commend him for that,” Dr. Wecht said, adding that he thinks Mr. Wolf should “move faster and in a more widespread fashion.”
Dr. Wecht specifically criticized Mr. Wolf — whom he said he’s hesitant to criticize because of a personal and political appreciation — for his recent statements about Pennsylvanians who want to reopen parts of the economy or their own shops and counties without state approval.
“These folks are choosing to desert in the face of the enemy. In the middle of a war that we Pennsylvanians are winning, and that we must win,” Mr. Wolf said recently, according to Spotlight PA. “They need to understand the consequences of their cowardly act.”
To deem those who are not willing to continue total sequestration and restriction “cowardly” is “despicable,” Dr. Wecht said, who claimed by making that statement, the governor insulted people who have lost their jobs and no longer have an income while he maintains a salaried position.
Beyond that, Dr. Wecht said he’s bothered by the asymmetry of responses across the U.S., and how in one state, people can flock to the beach while in other states, they can’t.
He said if something good comes from the pandemic, it could be that nursing homes — which are to a great extent “woefully inadequate” in the U.S. — may undergo greater scrutiny and develop a higher quality of care.
Until then, Dr. Wecht said he doesn’t see things changing for the better on a wide-scale basis, and that Americans will continue to pay an unnecessarily high price.