{"id":1642126,"date":"2022-09-15T16:49:40","date_gmt":"2022-09-15T20:49:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=1642126"},"modified":"2022-09-15T16:50:49","modified_gmt":"2022-09-15T20:50:49","slug":"my-brother-died-alone-amid-strident-covid-restrictions-more-humility-from-fauci-would-be-welcome","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/my-brother-died-alone-amid-strident-covid-restrictions-more-humility-from-fauci-would-be-welcome\/","title":{"rendered":"My Brother Died Alone Amid Strident Covid Restrictions \u2013 More Humility From Fauci Would Be Welcome"},"content":{"rendered":"<aside class=\"mashsb-container mashsb-main mashsb-stretched\"><div class=\"mashsb-box\"><div class=\"mashsb-count mash-medium\" style=\"&quot;\"><div class=\"counts mashsbcount\">32<\/div><span class=\"mashsb-sharetext\">SHARES<\/span><\/div><div class=\"mashsb-buttons\"><a class=\"mashicon-facebook mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/sharer.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.conservativenewsdaily.net%2Fbreaking-news%2Fmy-brother-died-alone-amid-strident-covid-restrictions-more-humility-from-fauci-would-be-welcome%2F\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Facebook<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-twitter mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?text=&amp;url=https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=1642126&amp;via=ConservNewsDly\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Twitter<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-subscribe mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"#\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Subscribe<\/span><\/a><div class=\"onoffswitch2 mash-medium mashsb-noshadow\" style=\"display:none\"><\/div><\/div>\n            <\/div>\n                <div style=\"clear:both\"><\/div><\/aside>\n            <!-- Share buttons by mashshare.net - Version: 4.0.47--><p>Dr. Anthony Fauci recently announced he will be stepping down from all government positions, including his position as chief medical advisor to President Joe Biden. As the most notable public health official leading America\u2019s response to COVID for the past two and a half years, Fauci has repeatedly declared, \u201cI represent science.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>My family abided by the severe restrictions Fauci demanded of Americans throughout the pandemic. During that time, my parents lost their son \u2014 and I lost my brother \u2014 to a non-Covid illness. The devastating consequences of the government-mandated restrictions made his death that much more awful and, in my opinion, more preventable. A little more humility, along with an honest acknowledgement of the steep downsides of the policies he championed, would be a welcome change before Fauci leaves office.<\/p>\n<p>When the country shut down in March 2020, at Fauci\u2019s recommendation, my brother and I were most concerned about protecting our elderly parents. My father suffers from Parkinson\u2019s disease, and this comorbidity renders him especially vulnerable if he contracts the virus.<\/p>\n<p>We diligently wore masks, and I began purchasing them even when Fauci and other public health officials initially discouraged the practice. When mask guidance was reversed in April 2020, my family gladly complied. My <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nbcnews.com\/think\/opinion\/trump-s-coronavirus-response-questioned-daily-dr-fauci-dr-birx-ncna1192266\">objections<\/a>, detailed publicly, centered not on the wisdom of mask-wearing but on the tardiness of the medical experts to reach their updated conclusion.<\/p>\n<p>My family also dutifully \u201csocially distanced.\u201d My brother, who lived two hours away from my parents, no longer entered their house for fear of infecting them through asymptomatic spread. Prior to the pandemic, he visited almost every weekend.<\/p>\n<p>As it turned out, my brother, an able-bodied man in his late 40s, was far more vulnerable during the pandemic than we could have ever imagined. He had various pre-existing health issues, and they were exacerbated by his reaction to the lockdowns.<\/p>\n<p>An interpreter by profession, my brother used to meet with multiple clients at multiple venues each day. Those interactions ended when the country shut down. The emotional support he had derived from the regular visits to our parents also ceased. He had also quit smoking, given the major risk factor for heart disease, just before the pandemic. In isolation, though, he returned to the habit.<\/p>\n<p>In early September 2020, he had a heart attack, which led to admittance to intensive care units at a couple of hospitals in the San Francisco Bay Area. After two short weeks, he passed away.<\/p>\n<p>My family did not get to see him one last time to bid farewell. Washington Hospital in Fremont, where he died, informed me that no visitors were allowed \u2014 unless the patient was on their death bed, breathing their last breaths. This meant that patients like my brother, who passed away unexpectedly in the middle of the night, died alone or in the company of medical personnel.<\/p>\n<p>While at St. Rose Hospital in Hayward, a prior ICU where my brother was admitted, he told me he felt like he was \u201cbeing tortured\u201d by the treatment provided. After his death, I called nearly every one of his doctors at both hospitals to find out what had transpired. Each of them tried to provide answers, except for one doctor at St. Rose, who reacted with hostility and refused further discussion after a few minutes. Now, nearly two years after my brother\u2019s death, questions about why he felt \u201ctortured\u201d remain unanswered.<\/p>\n<p>My brother\u2019s funeral, limited to 20 attendees, featured a slew of grey-haired relatives older than he. My mother, stricken with grief, repeatedly demanded an answer from the heavens for why her son was taken away. As I attended to her, my father sat alone in a wheelchair in front of my brother\u2019s casket.<\/p>\n<p>Multiple factors contributed to my brother\u2019s untimely death, including lifestyle choices, illnesses, and circumstances that existed long before the pandemic. Like others suffering from sudden loss, my parents and I have repeatedly asked ourselves what more we could have done while he was still alive.<\/p>\n<p>With that said, I believe my brother\u2019s chances of surviving would have been higher had strident COVID restrictions not existed. I could have showed up in-person at the hospital by his bedside, tracked down his doctors, demanded any necessary improvements to his care, and advocated on his behalf when he was gravely ill. At the very least, my parents and I could have seen him before he died.<\/p>\n<p>Sadly, my family\u2019s tragedy is not ours alone. The lockdowns and other COVID restrictions \u2014 recommended by Fauci and implemented by federal, state, and local governments \u2014 have exacted a gargantuan price on Americans.<\/p>\n<p>Americans\u2019 health <a href=\"https:\/\/www.wsj.com\/articles\/how-the-covid-19-pandemic-changed-americans-health-for-the-worse-11659260165?mod=article_inline\">deteriorated<\/a> due to anxiety, depression, weight gain, a sense of isolation, and missed doctor\u2019s visits or medical screenings. The death rate, in general, among younger adults, such as my brother, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.wsj.com\/articles\/fauci-and-walensky-double-down-on-failure-covid-pandemic-evidence-data-lockdowns-mask-mandates-restrictions-public-health-experts-11660855180?cx_testId=3&amp;cx_testVariant=cx_4&amp;cx_artPos=4&amp;mod=WTRN#cxrecs_s\">surged<\/a>, with a majority of the deceased suffering from non-COVID causes. Meanwhile, my brother<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Dr. Anthony Fauci recently announced he will be stepping down from all government positions, including his position as chief medical advisor to President Joe Biden. As the most notable public health official leading America\u2019s response to COVID for the past two and a half years, Fauci has repeatedly declared, \u201cI represent science.\u201d My family abided &#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1642128,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","fifu_image_url":"","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1642126","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1642126","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1642126"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1642126\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1642128"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1642126"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1642126"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1642126"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}