THE RESILIENCE OF OUR STATE Fred A. Lopez, MD, MACP
Several years ago, I wrote a guest editorial entitled “Infectious Diseases in the 21 st Century: No End in Sight.” 1 In it I quoted Dr. Robert Petersdorf, a legend in the field of infectious diseases, who wrote in the late 1970s, when referring to graduating fellows in infectious diseases: “Even with my great personal loyalty to [the discipline of] infectious diseases, I cannot conceive of a need for 309 more infectious diseases experts unless they spend their time culturing each other.” 2 Times have definitely changed. Over the past four decades or so, the advent of AIDS and hepatitis C, enhanced vaccine development, the impact of multidrug-resistant bacteria, foodborne epidemics, the emergence of infections due to pathogens such as the Zika and Ebola viruses, and our perpetual struggle withmutating influenza viruses have increasingly positioned the field of infectious diseases at the forefront of medicine and public health. And now, of course, the world is grappling with SARS-CoV-2, the virus responsible for COVID-19, causing the general population to think more about infectious diseases than it ever has before—or ever wanted to. Because of the significance of the global pandemic, the Journal of the Louisiana State Medical Society , a vanguard of the medical community in our state since 1844, is providing an update on COVID-19 in this issue. Articles written by various medical professionals address the disease’s clinical aspects (epidemiology, diagnostics, therapeutics, complications, and prevention); its impact on student and resident training; and the challenges associated with leading a Department of Medicine during a pandemic. Hurricane Katrina or COVID-19? As a Louisiana native, I have often asked myself which has proven more formidable, having lived through the experience of caring for patients during the former at the iconic Charity Hospital and now caring for patients with the latter at our university teaching hospital. 3 For many involved in healthcare in this state, Hurricane Katrina has provided a referential point to affix experiences in time (i.e., “pre-Katrina” or “post-Katrina”), but with the novel coronavirus reaching its toxic tentacles into seemingly every aspect of our lives for such a protracted period, it may well become the new chronological marker in Louisiana. I do not view either disaster as an exclusive holder of this mantle but rather consider both to be examples of the resilience of our state in addressing some of its greatest recent challenges. We hope that you find this issue helpful in your understanding of COVID-19 and its collateral effects, a pandemic whose vast impact will be felt for many years to come.
Fred A. Lopez, MD, MACP Richard Vial Professor LSU School of Medicine-New Orleans
REFERENCES 1. Lopez FA. Infectious diseases in the 21 st century: No end in sight. Emergency Medicine 2009;41:8. 2. Petersdorf RG. The doctors’ dilemma. N Engl J Med . 1978;299(12):628-634. 3. Lopez FA. In the Eye of the Storm: Charity Hospital and Hurricane Katrina. The Pharos Winter 2006; 4-10. I would like to thank Michelle Holt, M.Ed., M.F.A., Managing Editor for the LSU Department of Medicine, for her assistance.
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