Placing ourselves in harm’s way

Our WhatsApp groups and forums were buzzing with contrasting opinions

When I was a lad, they were still talking about Hurricane Debbie. They talked about it all through the ’60s and ’70s, because gales were as rare then as an Irish win over New Zealand. Now it seems that three or four times every winter I sit anxiously at the window, watching the trees as if willpower could stop them falling on the house.

In 2025, the new American and Irish Governments seem to think that climate change is some fancy idea that should not be allowed in the way of making more money for the rich. Millions of people killed and displaced from hurricanes, droughts, and wildfires are worth less than corporate greed. We shall just have to deal with the worsening weather until we can no longer do so.

So yet again, with Storm Éowyn, we GPs were wondering what to do regarding work. Our WhatsApp groups and forums were buzzing with contrasting opinions. On the one side we had the stiff upper lip, old school GP who was scared of nothing. This plucky stalwart announced that he would be at his desk to answer emergency calls, no matter what colour the warning. He was not alone. Many a GP was ready to put their life on the line, even if it involved driving when they shouldn’t. On the other side, one GP declared that his medical degree did not protect him from harm.

Is a GP a first responder? The IMO and Irish College of GPs reminded us, before Storm Éowyn hit, that we are essential, but not emergency workers.

I remember a Late Late Show special a few years ago, when the frontline staff for the Covid pandemic were officially thanked by a grateful audience and nation. There was not a GP in sight.

A couple of years later another Late Late Show had a rousing version of the theme tune, performed by a marching band to thank the frontline staff again. Among the clips of them in action was a masked medic, who may or may not have been a GP. We are not often thanked.

Long ago, in a remote spot, I received a phone call from the Garda station.

Now Jimmy (not his real name) was a local man suffering with alcoholism and serious mental health difficulties. He had apparently been pointing a gun out of his kitchen window at passers-by.

I was instructed to go and do a medical assessment.

Do you know what? I did. I approached the place on foot and found Jimmy snoring on the couch surrounded by empty bottles of Pernod. He had a fine-looking water pistol in his hand. I removed it, without waking him, drove to the Garda station and tossed it on the counter. They didn’t even thank me.

Sometimes I lie awake thinking of stupid things I have done and that is right up there. But it was like that in those days. Country GPs drove through floods, snowdrifts, and storms to terrifying emergencies.

I have attended the aftermath of suicides, crime scenes, prison cells, bombings, and sudden deaths without safety gear or any kind of counselling and have gone straight back to work afterwards. A person seeking drugs once threatened to knife me when I was doing my co-op shift. I told his GP the next day and he laughed at me. “He wouldn’t threaten me,” he said helpfully.

I also have spent a working life advising people about the dangers of smoking, drinking, drugs, unsafe sex, welding without goggles, using machinery without earmuffs, drink driving, junk food, and sitting down all day. I have told them not to put anything in their ears except their elbows and then popped my stethoscope in my own ears. We are like exuberant medical students talking about the liver disease on one ward and the heart failure on another, never dreaming that it could happen to them.

If a doctor heads out in a storm or puts their life in danger, what message do they give out? That the safety stuff is alright for the punters, but do as I say and not as I do? And they will probably only get in the way of the professionals with the helmets, radio contact, and four-wheel drives.

Mind you, if we had been asked on the Late Late Show that time, I might feel differently.