After a year away, it is wonderful to see the students back on campus for "in person" classes and other experiences, albeit with masks and other precautions necessary to deal with the delta-variant related surge in COVID-19 cases being seen in Nebraska and across the country.
Welcome, Class of 2025
Particularly exciting was the ability to have the incoming medical class gather at the Orpheum Theater along with family and friends for the annual White Coat ceremony. With its 30-year tradition at UNMC, this event symbolically marks the start of a new group of young women and men down the lengthy path to becoming physicians. The ceremony itself also serves as the unofficial start of the academic year.
Last year, the ceremony was put off with the hope that it could occur when the pandemic eased. Unfortunately, that did not occur, and we settled for a virtual event in early 2021 — unique and memorable, but not the same. It was moving to again see the students don their white coats and see the pride in the eyes of those in the audience. (Realistically, the eyes were about all we could see — the required pandemic masks covered up everything else.)
Congratulations to the class of 2025, it is great to have you as part of the College of Medicine.
@BradleyBritigan
A few days before the White Coat Ceremony, there was another first. I entered the twitter world and have sent out a few tweets related to the ceremony and other topics. So, if you are on Twitter and want to follow me, you can find me @BradleyBritigan.
COVID-19 update
Finally, the recent surge in COVID cases have engendered concern, frustration and stress within our college, at UNMC and for our clinical partners. I feel like the February groundhog. I came out of my hole, this time in June rather than February, and saw the sun. I thought that was great and that we were done with pandemic winter, only to discover that I now have much more winter to face and am back in my hole (or actually, on Zoom).
To those on the front lines daily providing care to the newly infected, our continued thanks and appreciation. The fact that much of the disease you are dealing with was preventable via the vaccine is tragic. For parents with children younger than 12 who need to return to school, there is the added stress of knowing that they must do so without the protection of a vaccine.
It behooves us all to advocate on their behalf for schools to take measures to maximize their safety until vaccines for their age group are available. Unfortunately, from what I have seen in Omaha and surrounding areas, "masks encouraged" or "masks recommended, but not required" translates to "no masks" in practice. Masks work! If they didn’t, surgeons wouldn’t need to wear them.
Although admittedly controversial, the vaccine mandate recently announced by UNMC and the Omaha health systems is past due, and the recent approval of the Pfizer vaccine further emphasizes the safety and efficacy of these vaccines.
We all need to do what we can to protect ourselves, our patients, and our community and being vaccinated is a critical part of doing so.