Are Government Vaccine mandates creating a healthcare crisis?

We are starting to see a major healthcare staffing shortage.

It’s ironic that the same camp currently blaming persons with acquired (Gold standard) immunity from prior infection of Covid, those with medical conditions preventing them from safely taking the shot, and the young and healthy who simply may not have any benefit from taking it, for overwhelming medical systems, when by ignoring the actual immunity status of a person, they are undermining the entire medical system? The crisis they are creating goes against every basic principle of Immunology. Essential frontline medical workers last year are highly likely to have already been exposed to Covid at one point, so why does no one simply ask for their immune status, instead of “ Vaccine - or no job”? The vaccine does not stop transmission of the virus, as we know. Why are we instead firing all the workers who may not even have any need for the Jab at all, and aren’t willing to jeopardize their own health by taking it?

A family friend is a nurse. She pointed out last week that at her hospital the Nurse understaffing is hitting critical numbers. She cited National Nurses United

“We know from numerous scientific studies, and from the results of the landmark nurse-to-patient ratios law in CA, that ratios save patients’ lives and improve quality of care, while also reducing nurse burnout and keeping experienced RNs at the bedside."

- Bonnie Castillo, NNU Executive Director & Registered Nurse

There are, in some cases, large numbers of very critical units in our hospitals, ready to walk away from their careers, because they don’t think it is safe to take the experimental, Emergency Use Authorization approved shot. A nurse in California wrote to author Alex Berenson last week, saying that 70 Neonatal intensive care unit nurses will walk away if nothing changes regarding the forced vaccination requirements to keep their job. Obviously, this coming to pass would be very bad for pre-mature babies in that area.

Now, for those who may not understand the hard decision some of these doctors and nurses have to make, I wanted to quote a very thorough insight into the overall Covid situation from Amber Nicole Straub :

You guys deserve to know.

One side is speaking loudly, and so will I.

My quality of life and livelihood has been threatened.

I encourage everyone to speak their truths and not be ashamed of what they believe.

The more I speak about it, the more support I find.

It’s time to stop being fearful and make a stand.

My name is Amber Straub.

I am a registered nurse.

I graduated from Centralia Community College (one of Washington’s, if not the top-ranking ADN nursing programs in the state) in 2015 before achieving my bachelor’s in Science of nursing from Saint Martins University (a prestigious private catholic University in Lacey, Wa) in 2016.

Before earning my BSN degree, I worked as a certified nursing assistant for almost a decade. Nursing has been my entire life, a career lasting over 15 years. I often tell people, I did not choose Nursing, rather it chose me. I do not work as a nurse, I AM a nurse. I love my career and couldn’t imagine doing anything else.

In addition to my science degree, I hold many certificates including:

*Advanced Cardiac Life Support

*Critical Care Registered Nurse Certification

*American Council of Exercise Fitness Nutrition Specialist (prior degree required)

*Pediatric Advanced Life Support

I also own a nurse health and wellness coaching business, an LLC, where I privately coach clients using a holistic approach towards health.

I have been working in an acute care hospital in Olympia WA (the capital of Washington State) for five years. It is one of two hospitals in Olympia/Lacey/Tumwater area. A population of about 100,000 residents. (Guesstimate)

I work as a charge nurse in the intensive care unit (ICU), progressive care unit (PCU), and Covid Unit. This position works with administrative staff in assisting with the overall flow of the hospital, preparing for admissions, discharges, being a resource for floor nurses, providing leadership, response to codes throughout the hospital, providing education and training, overseeing patient care, collaboration with hospital physicians for patient care, and much, much more.

I was highly involved in the integration and development of the covid unit. At this time, I was both terrified, and excited. I was fully prepared to utilize my skills in an effort to combat the pandemic. I wanted to be a part of this. I was honored to be able to serve in such a monumental time. We were prepared. We shut down the halls, designated covid areas, developed protocols, brought in PPE, and then….we waited.

We waited for a long time for something that never came. The halls stayed empty. We were wasting resources staffing a Covid unit that was never filled. We took the covid unit down. Things were starting to appear to be going back to normal. We were happy we did not become overwhelmed, as anticipated.

It is an odd virus. It affects everyone so differently. There are certainly some scary cases where patients are intubated with a ventilator and have multiple medications running- as fear portrays on the news- but this is rarely the case. For the most part, patients are on room air, nasal cannula, or high flow oxygen. The deaths, unfortunately, are mainly those suffering from co morbidities-such as diabetes, obesity, chronic lung disease, and/or our elderly population with sensitive immune systems.

Sadly, this population suffers more severely with many diseases, not just Covid.

I have held the hand of patients as they pass from Covid because they are alone and their families cannot be there. It has been an impactful couple of years, but this is something we nurses do on a normal basis, pandemic or not.

There is no ice truck out back where we are throwing dead bodies. The morgue is empty. This week I had an elderly individual pass from Covid complications (American average life expectancy is 78 years old) and met the mortician assistant who was transporting the body. I asked her, “have you guys seen a rapid increase in numbers at the morgue?”

Her reply “No, not at all. In fact, my boyfriend also works for a local funeral service and he has seen more suicides than Covid as of late.”

You see, in the beginning, we treated Covid inappropriately. As with most severe acute respiratory failure, we intubated them (the breathing machine). We now know, high peep ventilation is associated with a higher mortality rate because the pressure can damage the lungs. (Many patients do require ventilation for survival and do very well. The medical staff are well prepared and trained to handle this)

Instead, we provide an alternative source of oxygen (high flow), encourage Proning for 12 hours a day(laying on your belly), and have medications that successfully treat Covid, as well as some supplementation such as vitamin D and zinc.

We now have a much better understanding of how to treat Covid. We don’t have patients dying every day on ventilators.

Today, there was a record-breaking amount of Covid patients on the unit. Eight. It was 50% of our population because we only had 16 patients on the floor. This is also a phenomenon that occurred at the onset of the pandemic-people do not come to the ER when they are scared of the hospital because they believe they will get Covid.

For this reason, most of us nurses were actually on unemployment for the majority of the first wave. There were no patients to care for. I was one of those nurses who received minimal hours. Working only one shift a week on average. The OR (operating room) was also shut down, so those nurses needed unemployment and/or hours as well.

So here we are. 8 covid positive patients. None of which are ventilated. 4 on high flow, 1 on room air, 3 on oxygen either nasal cannula or face mask. The elderly individual did sadly pass.

We took one-off precautions because it had been 14 days post-exposure. Sent a couple of homes to finish out their recovery and ended the day with 5.

There was a request from a nearby facility (federal way) to take 2 of their Covid patients because we had beds available. There are many coming to ER and being sent home. They mostly come because they are scared to death after testing positive.

I was diagnosed with covid July 2021. My symptoms were very mild and had I not lost my taste, I would not have even thought to get tested. I watched my five-year-old contract Covid and her symptoms were also extremely mild. We now carry natural immunity (which is my preference) including natural T cell immunity against Covid 19 (which is long-lasting). I will not get vaccinated.

From my experience, 10-20% of covid admissions are vaccinated. 0% have previously had Covid, and 99% live.

The delta variant: There are FEW facilities that even carry the capacity to test for variations. I don’t think Washington even has one, but I could be wrong. When we receive the laboratory reading for Covid it simply says “detected” or “not detected”. Period.

We know now and understand that vaccinated individuals are carrying the disease. Either minimally symptomatic or asymptomatic. Therefore the disease is being spread by BOTH vaccinated and unvaccinated individuals.

The following is strictly my observation and educated opinion- but I think the kids have been carrying this the entire time. I believe they actually have been the asymptomatic spreaders. Their immune systems are so effective the symptoms are little to none, so no one has thought to test them. Well, now we do, because Mom was scared, got her runny-nosed kid tested. Came back positive, so she then notified the daycare, so now all the parents are testing their children and they are all coming back positive. The overall numbers rise, you see it on the media and here we are.

My daughter's daycare currently has 10 Covid positive kids and they are cold-like symptoms or none at all. Sadly, daycare is now closed.

I also wanted to touch on “overwhelmed hospital systems.” There are a lot of components that go into that phrase. For example, as a charge nurse, I acknowledge the time it takes to go in and out of Covid patient’s rooms because of PPE requirements. So, that nurse gets fewer patients than she typically would-formulating staffing issues.

Additionally, we are having difficulty placing patients in rehabilitation centers because they continue to test positive for Covid, even if they have been successfully treated, even months ago.

Also, patients are coming into the hospital for unrelated illness or surgery, being rule out tested for admission, then randomly coming up positive with no symptoms. They now have to go into isolation and have prolonged hospital stays.

There is also a shortage of nursing staff.

These are some of the contributions to overwhelmed hospitals, it’s not so much the hospitals are swamped with Covid patients.

Now, I want to address certain populated areas. Florida, NYC, Texas, etc.

I have spoken with many travel nurses who have worked in Covid units that state it was hell on earth and I believe them.

However, I have not personally witnessed this at any capacity throughout the pandemic.

Being one of two hospitals in a densely populated area here in the capital of Washington, we “round robin” with each other. Meaning, when one is full, we each take turns taking admissions from the community when we are both on divert. Our community hospital is smaller than the other but regardless when the larger hospital is full, they go on divert then we take the remainder, and so on and so forth so each hospital system affects the other if you get the idea.

There are approximately 30-40 covid admissions between our two hospitals in this 100,000 populated area.

Not all Covid patients are ICU status. Some are medical/surgical, or progressive care status. However, in efforts to reduce the risk of infection, we designated the higher level of care units (ICU/PCU) units and staff to care for these patients.

That also plays a part in this and contributes to overwhelmed hospital systems.

Ask questions when you hear hospitals are “full”.

How much of that is because of covid, versus lack of staff or equipment?

Ask for numbers and compare them to your community. Make your own data.

Then ask yourself if you believe what we have done to this country calls for those statistics.

What other solutions may be a more appropriate response?

Ok, next. This is going to be sensitive. I think a lot of medical staff have felt a certain sense of empowerment/belonging, or automatic associations with a particular side, or feel compelled to belong to a particular side, and have used this pandemic as a sense of purpose. I feel it’s an over-exaggeration.

It’s not that bad.

Maybe, because I’m a tough-as-nails strong female who was raised by an ex-military single father, who has been nursing for over 15 years.

That’s just my opinion.

I think there is a lot of psychology happening here. And obviously, politics.

The benefits of what we have done do not outweigh the risks. Our rights, our children, school, businesses, mental health, economy, livelihood, suicide, depression, weakened immunity from social distancing, riots…all and more. The life of this country has been stripped from us. The joy is GONE.

This has gotten way out of control. My heart is heavy with grief over the loss. Not from covid patients, but from the loss of joy. The loss of joy over mandating futile measures against a disease that does not work and does not reflect the situation at hand.

My employment is jeopardized, my daughter will be forced to wear a mask in kindergarten and I believe we are well on our way to another lockdown. We all should know by now the negative harms of a lockdown.

What we have done will take generations to recover from.

Mother Nature will take her course, whether we like it or not. Herd immunity will be acquired but we will not eradicate this virus. It is respiratory and mutates much as many other viruses do. This is a normal and expected epidemiological process. We cannot hide from it.

I acknowledge there has been a great loss from this disease. I am not disregarding the deaths or long-term effects Covid has had, in small percentages, on this country. But.

Stop pointing fingers at the unmasked or the unvaccinated. Stop segregating us. Stop the hate. Stop the abuse. Stop the theatrics.

This is no one’s fault.

This is extremely out of control.

And blown way out of proportion.

This is MY medical and clinical voice as a frontline worker, who has been living and breathing the reality. I am entitled to it.

YOU are free to your own beliefs and interpretations of the events which you have encountered.

The vaccine is available. Take it, if you want it. Don’t, if you do not. But dear God, let us live.

Freely.

Amber Straub, RN BSN CCRN ,August 10th, 2021

In conclusion, what will we do without these highly skilled workers, who are very much needed to make society work?

Some think a parallel system will be needed, in case some states or the Federal Government decided to cut out care to the people who are Unvaccinated. Very unfortunately, this is already happening. Some Hospitals have issued a notice requesting unvaccinated patients on the transplant waiting lists to be removed. There are many who point out that this undermines the Hippocratic Oath.

Where does this leave us? Some doctors and nurses who spent the better part of their adulthood acquiring these skills to save lives are being kicked to the curb, as are Unvaccinated patients in dire need of care. The only logical further step is underground care systems to fill the void. But how will this work?

If you have an answer or wish to coordinate with others, I’d be happy to connect with people.

Thank you for all you have done over the past year, Doctors and Nurses. We will not only remember the hard shifts you’ve had to pull, but the scrutiny you’ve had to stand up to if your medical opinion did not align with the mainstream narrative.

Love,

Tami Cam