This is the title I chose for my personal blog, which is meant to give me an outlet for one of my favorite crafts – writing – plus to use an image from my favorite sport, golf.  Out of college, my first job was as a reporter for the Daily Astorian in Astoria, Oregon, and I went on from there to practice writing in all of my professional positions, including as press secretary in Washington, D.C. for a Democrat Congressman from Oregon (Les AuCoin), as an Oregon state government manager in Salem and Portland, as press secretary for Oregon’s last Republican governor (Vic Atiyeh), and as a private sector lobbyist.  This blog also allows me to link another favorite pastime – politics and the art of developing public policy – to what I write.  I could have called this blog “Middle Ground,” for that is what I long for in both politics and golf.  The middle ground is often where the best public policy decisions lie.  And it is where you want to be on a golf course.

This blog question arises in my mind because of the trials and tribulations America – and the world – are facing these days with the rise of the Covid 19 Delta Variant virus.

I am not a doctor, far from it.  But I remember the Hippocratic Oath as one many doctors not only took, but lived by.

I thought of this when I read a column by Ruth Marcus, deputy editorial page editor of the Washington Post. 

Her basic premise appeared under this headline:

Doctors should be allowed to give priority to vaccinated patients when resources are scarce

Further, she wrote:

“I’m going to come right out and say it:  In situations where hospitals are overwhelmed and resources such as intensive care beds or ventilators are scarce, vaccinated patients should be given priority over those who have refused vaccination without a legitimate medical or religious reason.

“This conflicts radically with accepted medical ethics, I recognize.  And under ordinary circumstances, I agree with those rules.  The lung cancer patient who’s been smoking two packs a day for decades is entitled to the same treatment as the one who never took a puff.  The drunk driver who kills a family gets a team doing its utmost to save him — although, not perhaps, a liver transplant if he needs one.  Doctors are healers, not judges.

“But the coronavirus pandemic, the development of a highly effective vaccine, and the emergence of a core of vaccine resisters along with an infectious new variant have combined to change the ethical calculus. Those who insist on refusing the vaccine for no reason are not in the same moral position of the smoker with lung cancer or the drunk driver.

“In situations where resources are scarce and hard choices must be made, they are not entitled to the same no-questions-asked, no-holds-barred medical care as others who behaved more responsibly.”

Marcus makes great points.  Plus, I agree with her.  Anti-vaxxers should pay a price for their abhorrent conduct and the rest of us should benefit with better access to health care.

I thought of this as Salem Health, the main hospital where I live, went on record saying that it is out of hospital beds for patients, including intensive care beds.  One reason?  The unvaccinated are taking a number of those beds.

Consider the Hippocratic Oath, the one most doctors take to verify their intent to provide quality care for patients.  What it says, in sum, in this:

“Treat the sick to the best of one’s ability, preserve patient privacy, teach the secrets of medicine to the next generation, and so on.”

Agreed.  But, today, anti-vaxxers, I submit, have given up their right to “in line” medical care because of their conduct…they deserve to suffer the fate their obstinance requires. 

I decided to ask one of my friends, a medical doctor, what she thought of this conundrum – an oath exists, likely has been taken, and governs care for decades, but then potentially is overcome by an unforeseen circumstance – Covid 19.

While I wait for her response, I post this blog.