Image by Ri Butov from Pixabay
The recent outbreak of COVID-19 has gripped the world with apprehension. Our brains are on overdrive. We are constantly dealing with an invisible threat because we don’t know who is infected. Anyone could infect us. We don’t know how bad it will get or how long it will last. It’s a global threat; no community is safe. Many amongst us are reckoning with individual losses, such as illness and death– or loss of employment as a result of economic upheaval–or communal grief as we watch our healthcare, education and economic systems destabilize. All this is changing the way we see and perceive threat.
Princeton’s Angus Deaton, winner of the 2015 Nobel Prize for economics, coined the term “deaths of despair,” referring to fatal consequences associated with unemployment. He blamed the recently increased rates of suicide, drug overdose and alcohol-related liver disease on the changing economic situation. Every 1% increase in unemployment leads to a 3.5 % increase in opioid addiction. With the ongoing pandemic, we are seeing alcohol and drug use on the rise. Because the virus attacks the lungs, it poses a serious threat to those who smoke tobacco or marijuana; aerosols harm the lung and diminish the ability to respond to infection. COVID-19 endangers people with opioid use disorder and methamphetamine use disorders. Having a respiratory disease while abusing opioids increases the risk of overdose, due to diminished lung functioning. Methamphetamine constricts the blood vessels in the lungs, compounding the damage caused by the virus.
The gift of olfaction is one of the joys of life, which most of us take for granted. Food is more than just fuel; it is also one of the greatest pleasures in life. The madeleine memories triggered by food are involuntary. Losing one’s sense of smell and taste—as can occur with COVID-19 can be a huge emotional loss. The American Academy of Otolaryngology-Head and Neck Surgery recently proposed that anosmia (loss of smell) with resultant dysgeusia (change in taste) be added to the list of screening tools for COVID-19.
