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President’s Message
By Terence Joiner, MD
A Different Kind of Long Hauler
“Long haul” is a term that originated in the late 19th century as a way to assign the rate paid
What can we do to combat this? I was on a ski trip with 3 friends when news of the Atlanta shootings broke. One of my companions questioned why anyone should be concerned about killings of six Asian spa workers in Atlanta. My answer was because “Asian lives matter!”
In our personal lives, we may have experienced and unknowingly perpetuated some of these stereotypes. Have we learned through our experiences and interac- tions how to confront our own internal prejudices? We, and I include our Asian American colleagues, still have a lot to learn from one another.
A good start would be to listen more carefully to what our colleagues are saying. Ibram X. Kendi, a scholar I have come to rely on, writes that we must take anti-racist actions in response to racist negative actions and tropes. To be an anti-racist may be challenging for us in some of our daily lives. We can’t take being anti-racist for granted. It is hard work! For those who are interested, I highly recommend Kendi’s best-selling book, “How to Be
an Antiracist.“
I also recommend reviewing recommendations and requests of inclusion specifically within our medical trainee community in the piece, “In light of anti-Asian attacks, medicine needs to listen to Asian American trainees” co-written by WCMS’ own medical stu-
dent, Jesper Ke.
When I think of those that have suffered as victims of racism, this is as good a time as any to right the course. In some contexts, being anti-racist will not be popular. However, in the long run, we will all feel better. Remem- ber how good it felt to say “Black Lives Matter” as part of the protest against police brutality?” In the same spirit of solidarity, we can say “Asian Lives Matter.” Doesn’t that feel good? Say it again. And again.
As members of our medical society, we are called om to continually challenge the frontiers of medicine in legislative and regulatory spaces and act on an array of advocacy items. As often as we’re asked to engage with legislators on items like scope of practice, prior authori- zation, mental health access, and public health issues, we also need to recognize the advocacy items our
for transporting goods on the railroad: long hauls were more difficult and required more resources. With the advent of automotive transport, the term naturally was adapted to describe the truckers that transported goods long distances in 18-wheelers, i.e., long-hauler truckers. At the same time, the hardships suffered by those engaged in long hauls became the basis for a metaphor applied to any person of group suffering hardship over a long period of time. In the plague year of 2020, the term long-haulers has been used to describe the cohort of patients that suffer disabling lingering effects of SARS-CoV2 infection.
It seems to me, as I look about in today’s world, that the term long-hauler could equally be applied to other population groups. Since the outbreak of COVID-19 in February and March 2020, our country has been suffer- ing from a parallel long-term affliction, namely the age-old plague of racism Americans have struggled with since before the United States became a country. And while we may think of racism as applying mainly to prejudice against African-Americans, it is actually much broader than that, applying to all non-“white” races and ethnicities as shown by the recent attacks on Asians and Asian-Americans across our country and most horrifi- cally exemplified by the killing of six Asian women in Atlanta on March 16, 2021. The investigation of these murders may still be ongoing, but many consider them to have been hate crimes.
Asians and Asian Americans are frequently the objects of harmful stereotypes in communities from New York to San Francisco. Attacks against Asians are not uncom- mon: According to Stop AAPI Hate, there were 3,800 instances of discrimination against Asians between March 19, 2020, and February 28, 2021.1 In addition, a study of statistics from 16 of our county’s police depart- ments found a 150 percent increase in hate crimes against Asians, at the same time the overall crime rate decreased 7 percent.2 So, Asian Americans are long haulers too when it comes to racism. The assaults on Asian Americans are a cruel reminder how precarious the lives of minorities are in our country.
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4 Washtenaw County Medical Society BULLETIN APRIL/MAY/JUNE 2021