President Joanne Pierson rang the bell to open the meeting. Tom Strode played America the Beautiful. Dawn Johnson provided the Inspiration, noting that December is Disease Prevention and Treatment Month. She referenced Rotarians’ resilience and perseverance in its effort to build goodwill and improve the quality of life for others. Don Duquette provided a video featuring Ryan Cordell on the guitar singing a song about COVID-19. On November 16, 2020, linguist Gretchen McCulloch wrote the lyrics to this song as a Twitter thread in response to news that Dolly Parton had contributed 1 million dollars toward the development of one of the most promising COVID-19 vaccines.

President Joanne extended thanks to all the people who make the meetings run smoothly and congratulated this week’s one birthday celebrant. She announced that Lu Hewko, father of Rotary International General Secretary and CEO John Hewko, died last week.  John has addressed out club the evening we returned to the newly renovated Michigan Union. Lu lived at Glacier Hills.

President Joanne announced that our Community Assessment payments are due by the end of December and reminded us that we can make voluntary contributions to our Foundation and Every Rotarian Every Year donations to the RI Foundation and Polio Plus.

We all joined in congratulations to Collyer Smith, newly designated 6380 District Governor Nominee for the 2023-24 Rotary year.  Collyer reported on his interview question asking what he would be doing in 2-3 years. He answered that with all the changes and uncertainty he would be focusing on adaptability, flexibility and innovation.  He wants to see more community events led by Rotarians, citing his experience mounting an event focused on mental health when 1100 people turned out for the event, far surpassing the 2500 he hoped would participate.  He explained why he wants to be District Governor.  There were four big events during his presidential year, so he has experience overseeing very big projects.  He has received a lot of support from the club, both during his presidency and with his mental health event.  And although disappointed he was not chosen during the last round, he decided getting back on the horse and trying again was better than reflecting on last year’s loss.  He will be a fine District Governor – and who knows what is ahead for him in Rotary?

Peg Talburtt introduced Peggy Cole, Director of Development for Packard Health.  Packard Health received a $5000.00 grant from our Disaster Relief Committee.  An anonymous donor was inspired to add another $1000.00 so with $6000.00 Packard Health to issue 105 blood pressure monitoring kite to its clients.  The American Heart Association heard of the project and provided funding for another 50 kits.  This project has matured into an ongoing association between the two organizations.  Peggy told us more about the many and varied health services available at Packard Health’s three locations, and via virtual and in home visits.

Program:

Dawn Johnson took back the microphone to introduce our speaker, Dr. Preeti Malani. Dr. Malari is the University of Michigan’s Chief Health Officer and Professor of Medicine in the Division of Infectious Diseases. She is also the director of the University of Michigan’s National Poll on Healthy Aging. Her clinical expertise includes both infectious diseases and geriatric medicine.

Dr. Malani began her presentation on Health Equity and Policy Considerations by noting our work on polio. On the pandemic, she noted that because there was no coordinated federal response, there were fifty different responses, many with little scientific input.  The first case of the new virus presented in Wuhan in December, then the first in the U.S. in Washington state in January.  She showed several graphs and charts that illustrated the effects of income disparity, the comparison of death rates among countries of the world, the excess deaths. She talked about the social factors that are at the bottom of the disparate impact of the virus on communities of color vs.white communities.

Overall health has been greatly affected by the virus because people are reluctant to go for routine evaluations and because the health system is overloaded. Regular recreational activities for adults and children have also been constricted. The increase in internet searches for information about mental health has been huge.  Substance abuse rates are increasing and people report more feelings of loneliness and loss of social contacts, more thoughts about suicide. Dr. Malari addressed the long term impact of covid on people who have recovered, noting that people have very long recovery periods, some lasting months.  Long term damage from the virus are unknown at this time. There is stigma associated with having covid, and great anxiety among friends and family of victims.  Attacks on public health officials are demoralizing.

Dr. Malani is optimistic about the vaccinations that seem just around the corner.  She thinks they will be distributed equitably according to decisions of the CDC – no skipping the lines for people with influence.  She believes that as more people are vaccinated without incident those reluctant to step up will be convinced.  Accurate information and a consistent message are critical to acceptance of the vaccine.  Mitigation efforts will have to continue even as the vaccine covers more and more people. There will be more viruses threatening the world so we need good surveillance and cooperation around the globe to prevent another pandemic.  We need to strengthen our public health infrastructure and begin to prioritize prevention over treatment.

Next week will be our last meeting of 2020.  The program will be, as tradition, a performance by the Huron High School Choir.

Dr. Malani’s last slide showed a beautiful sunrise over Strawberry Lake, and President Joanne’s closing quote from Aristotle was fitting: “It is during our darkest moments that we must focus to see the light.”

Dr. Malani’s full presentation can be viewed here: https://www.dropbox.com/s/5jhxavk6em3et9l/2020-12-09%20Dr.%20Preeti%20Malani.mp4?dl=0

Her slides can also be viewed and downloaded by clicking here.