Coronavirus: Stop ‘cruel positivity’ about virus going after elderly – Helen Martin

WHEN I was aged 23, I went to the movies to watch Logan’s Run. It was set in the year 2274, in which the only way humans could survive with limited resources was to kill off everyone when they hit 30. Obviously, it was a bit of fictional horror.

I can’t recall the whole plot but it made sense that they must have started with 80 or 90-year-olds, and reduced euthanasia age as food and everything else ran out.

Will that ever happen? I doubt it. But I can understand why elderly people today are feeling worse about coronavirus than the young to middle-aged, because the majority who have died so far are roughly 70 and over.

There have been exceptions though, including the 34-year-old Chinese doctor Li Wenliang, who discovered it and tried to raise the alarm, and died.

Most, if not all, elderly who have been killed by the virus have been ill anyway. Very sad but until now, if people are old and fit, they should survive.

The scariest report I read was that senior English-based medics have predicted that the NHS is so under-funded and intensive care beds so reduced, that if the virus is as bad and widespread as 2009 swine flu, treatment of those most likely to survive (younger) would have to be prioritised over the most vulnerable (old).

Everyone hopes it doesn’t become as bad as that. But I do loathe people who comfort themselves throughout this spreading disease with the notion that “only” the elderly will die. Even defining the elderly as being en-route to the end-of-life anyway is nasty and ignorant.

My mother was a high-grade nursing sister with the NHS until she was 67, worked for a private hospital until she was over 70, and died aged 98. Difficult to remember at which point she became considered as “elderly”.

When I hit 50, I was stunned by postal stuff from Saga and all these “over-50s” social services and clubs that were promoted and advertised. Why was 50 deemed old? Today, that would include Matthew McConaughey, Jay-Z, Helena Bonham-Carter and Nicole Kidman!

When folk nowadays pass into their 60s (I’m almost 67) they might be seen by younger generations as out of touch with modern developments and deemed as needing support from their grown “kids”. But with the state of the economy, many are still supporting their children and their families.

Medics in the 21st century don’t generally regard 60s as elderly. My breast cancer surgeon who carried out reconstruction was satisfied that he had created “a nice cleavage”! I assume he would have done the same if the op happened three years later. My yoga has been suspended but in my last class I remember several 70-somethings who were enviable with their muscle control and flexibility.

So how do we define elderly status and attitude? It’s interesting to note than Boris Johnson is 55, Theresa May is 63, Jeremy Corbyn is 70 and Donald Trump is 73. With heaps of money, they will be able to pay for private intensive care of course.

And how would elderly members of the public feel and deal with the idea that if the worst came to the worst, intensive care might not be available?

No-one would want to believe that they were going to be ruled out of any possible medical treatment to let them live on. But more important to them would be that their children and grandchildren had access to the best possible, saving, intensive care.

So please politicians and social media commenters, stop cruel positivity about only some elderly suffering virus fatality.