Reflecting on the COVID-19 global pandemic, five years later 

 

BERRIEN COUNTY, Mich.-- Tuesday marked exactly five years since the World Health Organization declared the COVID-19 outbreak and global pandemic.

Since then, 1.2 million Americans died from the virus and just last week another 274 people Nationwide lost their lives, according to the CDC that's the lowest number since the virus arrived.

"I don't think there's anyone alive that has seen anything like what COVID did to us. It completely turned the healthcare system upside down," said Dr. Robert Nolan, Corewell Health chief medical officer and emergency physician.

For Nolan, the greatest lesson of the COVID-19 global pandemic was collaboration among health systems.

"COVID was a huge equalizer across the board," he said. "We didn't know what was coming, we didn't know the science behind it, we hadn't had the chance to really learn about it, and for the first time, we really started to collaborate and learn processes, learn best practices, learn what was working, what wasn't working, and really break down the silos."

He said it's actually what spurred the merger between Lakeland and spectrum health creating Corewell Health.

Five years ago, first came the spread.

"I think public health in general was caught pretty flat-footed during the pandemic," said Berrien County Health Officer Guy Miller. "Probably our biggest role was interpreting new guidance, came out every week. And it would almost be like, to the hour."

"We were all in our PPE looking like space pirates," Nolan said. "Everybody that came in, they were all being quarantined in different areas."

Next came the lockdowns.

"Things definitely changed, people weren't out very much," said St. Joseph resident Stephen Frappier. "Going into banks and businesses, everybody had plexiglass. People were wearing masks."

"We knew that likely, this virus was going to go through the entire population," Miller said.

As disruptive, troublesome and isolating as the lockdowns were, they were effective, at least in Berrien County, which did not see an overwhelming spike.

"We went from, here in St. Joe, an average of like 130 patients that rolled through our emergency department today, we were seeing as little as 70 patients a day," Nolan said.

Finally, there came the vaccine.

"I think one of the great misinformation pieces was 'vaccines prevent disease,' and we know that's not true," Miller said. "Vaccinations decrease the severity of illness and reduce the likelihood of mortality. They don't prevent disease."

Now, COVID-19 has gone from pandemic to endemic.

"Covid has become one of those seasonal respiratory infections," Nolan said.

"Covid is here to stay. We know it will be around for a while," Miller said.

The pandemic may be over but its lessons, and the virus, remain.

"It's unfortunately not going to be an if, it's when we're hit with the next pandemic, nobody knows where it's going to come from, I think we've learned so much more about how to take care of patients, how to get supply chains going, how to mobilize all the talent around us so it's not just local, it's statewide, it's national."