Our doctors, nurses, carers and the entire healthcare system have been exhausted by the coronavirus pandemic and, as an additional effort, have overworked themselves. Soon, a great number of our fellow citizens will not have received the agreed treatment for their health problems, for example, a scheduled surgery or a diagnostic test. Therefore, a time will soon come where we will all know someone who has suffered due to the coronavirus crisis without having had the virus, as they were not able to receive timely treatment. Or when medics become so tired and drained that they can no longer work in hospitals or family health centres. Or when someone we know dies.
Our society is so small that we must take care of one another. Every one of us.
I invite you all to think deeply about what everyone – every person in Estonia – could personally do to immediately help our doctors, nurses and carers. Be it getting vaccinated, working from home, maintaining distance with fellow citizens, cancelling a family party, wearing a mask or taking another reasonable measure, we must all do something right now to the best of our judgement and ability. We must act and we must act now.
In caring for ourselves, we help doctors, nurses and carers so that they can help us. According to the heads of hospitals, the restrictions unfortunately do not seem to be working, nor are they being followed in society.
We have all drawn our first breaths in this world thanks to healthcare workers; many of us also take our last breaths under their care. Let us now take measures to ensure that as many Estonians as possible draw their lasts breaths well in the future rather than today, tomorrow or next week.
Let us now support our medical workers. Our actions affect not only ourselves but also everyone else – our loved ones, our co-workers and society as a whole.
