There's an interesting phenomenon locally. We are at the border with France and as a transfrontier worker, I know the lockdown styles from both sides of the border. There's a chain of supermarkets which has a branch in France and the other one in Spain within 3 or 4 kilometers of each other. The Spanish one sells better meat and has better prices. The French one is better for French stuff and other goodies like gluten free options. The French are looking forward to continuing their shopping and lifestyle in Spain, but the border is still tightly regulated. The Spanish have fewer reasons to visit France, although the French pharmacy has better prices and varieties than Spain. A nurse told me that she finally went to the supermarket in France and was shocked to see that no one wore masks nor did they offer alcohol gel at the door nor anything. Life as usual as they say. Whereas the same supermarket branch on the Spanish side even won a prize for enforcing various security measures: gloves, masks, distance, alcohol gel, Plexiglas... It was actually funny to see her reaction. I reassured her that France didn't get it worse than Spain despite their seemingly relaxed measures at some places. In fact, regardless of the measures taken, both regions on both sides of the border were hardly hit, relatively speaking.
It's interesting to watch how the reality changes when you cross the border. As more local people visit France for their normal routine stuff (shopping, trekking, etc), they'll get to see that not all is as it seems. And the French are going to be shocked when the border finally opens, and they come to the supermarket, the hairdresser, etc. Can't wait to hear about their reactions.
Primary Health Care continues to have restricted access. I can only see 4 patients a day from the hundreds of hundreds requesting a medical visit for a real consultation. So each time I get a phone consultation, I have to choose whom I'm actually going to see directly, keeping in mind that I can only see 4 per day. The rest I have to do by phone. There's a possibility of doing a consultation with software not too different from skype, but I haven't reached that point. In fact, I'm so busy with just the phone calls on a daily basis that I don't have time to read the various protocols that arrive each day to my inbox. And people are cranky by phone. It's harder to reassure people by phone as well. Nevertheless, I'm working actively to put order into chaos and in tuning down the fear factor.
I've never talked to the local psychiatrist and the local social worker so much in my life to discuss cases. People with a history of schizophrenia are doing perfectly well, seemingly better than anybody. But depression and anxiety triggered by various factors including the economic struggles are in excess. I have a few on watch for risk of suicide. And I even did a diagnosis of cancer without never actually seeing the patient the other day. I arranged all the studies by phone on suspicion and upon the ultrasound medical report, I alerted the specialist for a rapid diagnosis. Who would have thought that medicine was going to be practiced like this?
At least we're allowed to practice Palliative Care the normal way, now, that is. I'm reminded of the words of a patient who volunteered for WHO and who told me that not even the Ebola crisis got in the way between patients and their relatives. There were protocols in place so that relatives could see their loved ones with Ebola and say the final goodbye if that was the case. That's a basic right that was forgone during the COVID lockdown. That will make an interesting case for a Human Rights court. That and perhaps the fact that bars and restaurants are allowed to open during a "national emergency" while Primary Health Care has limited access.