Doctor Known For Speaking Out On Frontline Worker Realities Gets COVID Vaccine
YUMA, Ariz. (KYMA/KECY) - Blue metallic balloons accompanied by colorful signs with inspirational quotes decorated the walls inside of Yuma Regional Medical Center's (YRMC) makeshift vaccine center, giving a sense of hope and joy to the numerous staff rolling up their sleeves to get Moderna’s COVID-19 vaccine.
Amongst those that took the vaccine on the 2nd day of vaccine rollouts in Yuma County was Dr. Cleavon Gilman, the doctor popular for his outspokenness on Twitter about the realities that frontline healthcare workers faced at YRMC. Even receiving praise from President-elect Joe Biden.
“I am supposed to be really excited right now but it’s mixed emotions,” said Dr. Gilman moments after getting the vaccine. “Thousands of people have died from the coronavirus prior to this, they can’t have this experience.”
A lingering thought that many healthcare workers have, as they roll their sleeves back down and head into the nation’s ICUs and Emergency Rooms.
Patients battling the deathly toll on the human body recognize his face, but for Dr.Gilman remembering the faces of those that lost their battle only makes his voice even louder. Faces that now only exist in the minds of those that grieve them and the ones that cared for them in their last days.
“There has been a lot of politicians [that spread misinformation] that have jumped the line in front of healthcare workers,” said Dr. Gilman. “There are 300,000 people dead,” said Dr. Gilman. “There is an excess of people that are going to die on top of that, that is what my main concern is: saving as many lives.”
A concerning truth that exists at YRMC, threatening to shatter the only access to healthcare in rural Yuma, Arizona. It’s that exact commitment that Dr. GIlman made to the rural community that changed his mind from departing YRMC.
“I came to Yuma for a reason, I’m not going to abandon my community I love it here, I love working in the emergency room,” said Dr. GIlman. “Some patients will ask me ‘is this you’ and they’ll have the paper and they tell me ‘thank you for staying’ .”
Those thank you’s are like an elixir of life for these frontline workers, seeming to keep them alive as they head back to fight the next battle COVID-19 has for them.
“People are still getting very ill in our community, I have had to intubate a lot of people this week,” said Dr. Gilman. “This pandemic is like a war and people in the E.R. are like warriors, I got their back and they have mine.”
Eventually, daggers must be buried and ‘no mind is to be paid’ to what happened in the past, but what is seen has to be told.
“Nothing I say is negative on the hospital, my only goal since March is to try to save as many lives as possible that is my moral obligation,” said Dr. Gilman. “The vaccine is not going to end the pandemic, our voice is very important when telling people what we are seeing on the ground.”
Dr. Gilman is set to receive his second dose on January 20th, ironically on the same day that Joe Biden is scheduled to be sworn-in.
