Burn Down the “Healthcare Hero” Ideal
Stop calling healthcare workers “heroes”. Too many of us have gone unsaved.
The COVID-19 pandemic has brought a resurgence of admiration for the healthcare workers who are faced with overcrowded hospitals, scarcity of personal protection equipment, and just generally unsafe working conditions. It seems natural that the “healthcare hero” ideal would re-emerge during a time when hospitals are under the spotlight as gauges for how the United States is handling the pandemic. Still, many have rightfully discussed how this language has the potential to valorize the (unnecessary) risks that many of these folks are forced to take while doing their jobs. For instance, Dr. Justin Jones’s “Stop Calling us ‘Heroes’” outlines some of the potential harm of the “healthcare hero” label for healthcare workers pretty nicely.
However, I’m less interested in how the “healthcare hero” label hurts healthcare workers and more invested in how it hurts patients who find themselves at the mercy of these “heroes” and the facilities they work through.
For those who belong to any “othered” group, discomfort at being in the hospital isn’t from an irrational fear; it is a reaction to the reality that the means by which people are determined to be worth or not worth saving are tailored to white, slim, cis…
