Debbie Weil interrupts regular programming to address the Coronavirus pandemic and how this evolving situation is impacting older Americans. She is joined by her husband Sam Harrington, a retired physician, and a recurring guest on the show. They talk about how they are navigating uncertainty and unknowns differently (Sam as a physician, Debbie as a non-physician but with a new hunger for charts and numbers); magical thinking about what lies ahead; and what it really means to be older (they are both 68) and to face the possibility of illness and death.

This episode was recorded on March 15, 2020 so the number of positive Coronavirus cases Debbie cites is already sadly out of date. The pandemic in the U.S. continues to worsen: one of their greatest concerns, shared by many others, is that the U.S. hospital system will not have enough ICU beds for those who need them. Older Americans are worrying that medical triage of the critically ill will begin, with the elderly being passed over in favor of younger and potentially stronger patients.

The conversation is not about specific guidelines or statistics related to COVID-19, available elsewhere. See Resources below. It is about the psychological aspect of the pandemic. Debbie and Sam talk about how aging and ageism are interwoven; the way social distancing might impact different age groups; and the lingering question of how best to navigate these uncertain and confusing times.

What they talk about:

• The “herd” of elephants in the room: anxiety over who will die, the importance of flattening the curve and the reality of social distancing over a long period of time
• How members of Debbie and Sam’s immediate family have been responding differently to the pandemic (the physicians vs. the non-physicians)
• How doctors deny their own mortality when they go to work in a public health crisis
• Being old – or at least older – during the Coronavirus pandemic and how that feels
• Magical Thinking: nonsensical, perhaps, but a way to manage uncertainty and unknowns
• What Debbie and Sam’s biggest fears are
• Why the U.S. is not set up for “slow motion” uncertainty

At a time of crisis, it felt important to share a conversation between an older – yet young at heart and mind – couple. As Debbie says, there’s a lot of meaning in the words: we are all in this together. She sees a ray of hope in that phrase. Whatever we can do to comfort, to inform or even to entertain each other is useful. Podcasts are having a moment – to do just that. Which is why Debbie decided to go ahead with this episode even though it is not definitive, nor does it address everything.

Mentioned in this episode or useful resources:

• Coronavirus tracked: figures and charts continuously updated by the Financial Times. Prepared by data visualization journalist John Burn-Murdoch and based on data pulled from Johns Hopkins, WHO and the CDC.
• Coronavirus: Why You Must Act Now by Tomas Pueyo on Medium. 
• Coronavirus: The Hammer and the Dance by Tomas Pueyo on Medium

• CDC’s Coronavirus and COVID-19 resource page
• WHO on Coronavirus / COVID-19
• Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Resource Center
• STATnews coverage of the Coronavirus
• How Epidemiologists Understand the Novel Coronavirus (The New Yorker, March 15, 2020)
• Johns Hopkins COVID-19 newsletter  Subscribe free.