Doctors, nurses, and medical staff are fighting a new threat across the globe as they work on curing patients of the global pandemic COVID-19.

Multiple reports surfaced about the discrimination and abuse health workers receive while working on the front line. The incidents, which sometimes involves brutal beatings, sparked fear among medical professionals.

The World Health Organization believes the abuse is primarily due to the health care workers being "seen as a potential threat." The perpetrators fear they might expose others to the virus as opposed to being the solution to the current crisis.

Acid Bag

In Mexico, a health care worker named Esther Garcia was thrown a plastic bag filled with a mixture of water and bleach. She was reportedly walking to the bus stop after her shift when a young man attacked her.

"I was filled with fear," she said. "I didn't understand what was going on."

Garcia, like many fellow health workers, supports her family on a salary of about $700 a month. With the need to feed her two daughters, and being a divorced single mother, she cannot afford to leave her job.

Other medical personnel were sprayed with bleach, denied seats in public transportation, and even blocked from their communities.

Mexican authorities have condemned the mistreatment done by a "scattered minority" in a country where the workers are lauded for their efforts in the battle against COVID-19.

Abuse and Hostility

A medical staffer working in an unnamed hospital in New York said patients have repeatedly hurled verbal abuse at them. Others spit at the workers. Their front desk has received most of the damage, with some people throwing trash and coughing on the faces of the employees.

In Cortlandt, nurses who have finished their shifts found their tires slashed in the parking lot. Local authorities said the perpetrators slashed the tires of 22 vehicles.

Police arrested 29-year-old Daniel R. Hall for the crime. He was charged with criminal mischief and possession of a controlled substance after he was found with a small amount of PCP.

In Oklahoma, a nurse working at the Oklahoma University Medical Center was revealed to be a victim of an act of violence while on their way to work. Officials said the perpetrator believed the victim's role as a medical worker meant they were carrying and exposing people within their community to COVID-19.

PTSD


US-based research into moral injury showed first responders, and health care workers are at a high risk of developing trauma.

According to the article, moral injury stems from having to decide who gets a ventilator and who is left to die---a situation nurses and doctors have to face should the supply of medical equipment continue to decrease.

Medical workers are trained to save lives and not give up on people. Few have ever experienced a triage in which decisions had to be made due to a shortage of medical supplies.

The risk of developing moral injury is heightened b workers who take long shifts and have little to no sleep before going back on the job. They have lesser time to process the incident. If left unattended, it may lead to moral injury or PTSD.

The fight against the coronavirus crisis resembles that of a battlefield where there are inadequate resources and unending accumulations of the dead.

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