The consequences of the "hygienic" and "covert" death by covid

A nurse from the ICU of the Complejo Hospitalario de Navarra attends a patient admitted to the Intensive Care Unit on the 15th.Jesús Diges / EFE

Those killed by covid have become one more number. His figures, without images and without vital references, accompany every day those of infected, hospitalized, admitted to ICU and vaccinated. This is what the anthropologist Alberto del Campo, from the Pablo de Olavide University in Seville, qualifies as "hygienic death", which, among other things, according to what he says "hides the terror and suffering of those who have died alone." But these deaths have consequences, beyond death. Two different studies, one from the University of Cambridge (UK) and the other from Pennsylvania State (USA), coincide in calculating that, for every fatality due to covid, there is a direct impact on nine close relatives (grandparents, parents, siblings, partners or children), who are part of a health crisis,social and economic broader than that attributed directly to the coronavirus. According to the conclusion of the American study, published in

PNAS

, "could indirectly lead to higher mortality due to causes not related to the pandemic: aggravation of untreated chronic conditions, alcohol abuse, self-harm, domestic violence and other factors."

For the Sevillian anthropologist, “the sanitization of death is not an innocent strategy, nor is it how power tries to camouflage the calamity of the pandemic as if it were a natural catastrophe.

If it is presented as unavoidable, there are no responsible parties ”.

The sanitization of death is not an innocent strategy, nor is it how power tries to camouflage the calamity of the pandemic as if it were a natural catastrophe.

If it is presented as unavoidable, there are no responsible

Alberto del Campo, anthropologist at the Pablo de Olavide University of Seville

Del Campo has collected in

Thinking the pandemic

(Dykinson, 2021), a dozen works on the effects of the covid beyond health and the economy. In one of these studies, Alejandro González Jiménez-Peña, specialized in the philosophy of death, adds one more anthropological reason for this camouflage of death: “Death was once silenced, it was taboo yesterday, before the pandemic, and it could continue to be said which it is today, despite the pandemic ”.

González recounts how "daily death", the one prior to the pandemic, had become "forgotten, hidden, distant death, as someone else's business": "Before the covid broke into our lives, no one sat in a bar at dusk and, while he drank a beer, talked and pondered about death (…);

nobody explained to a child what it was.

And nobody did that because it was felt as something reserved for the future.

In the society that covers up death, the pandemic, aggressive, overwhelming death breaks out, which no longer only concerns others but also me.

However, we insist on continuing to hide it

Alejandro González Jiménez-Peña, specialist in philosophy of death

In that society, which the philosopher trained at the universities of Seville and Malaga describes as "concealer of death", "the pandemic, aggressive, overwhelming death breaks out, which no longer only concerns others but me." However, he adds: "Although it has returned to our lives, we insist on continuing to hide it."

But this concealment, premeditated, according to Del Campo, and also sociological, according to González, masks a reality that must be faced. If, as the study by the University of Pennsylvania concludes, the impact of each death extends to nine direct relatives, the more than 77,000 deaths from coronavirus registered in Spain have left some 700,000 more victims who, according to the study, “create a new wave challenges for the health of the population ”. If the excess of deaths for the year is taken into account, although they have not been directly attributed to the covid, the number of deaths rises to more than 90,000, which brings the number of affected to more than 800,000. In the world, the more than three million deaths represent more than 27 million affected.

Scientific studies show that "after experiencing the death of a close relationship, individuals are at increased risk for a number of negative life-course stressors and poorer health."

The work points from school failure, emotional breakdowns and loss of economic and social support to psychological effects.

"Future research should be careful to include family grief as a possible antecedent of adverse outcomes in multiple settings and stages of life," the study concludes.

All deaths have an effect on immediate family members.

But in those caused by the coronavirus, it is singular and greater

All deaths have an effect on immediate family members. But in those caused by the coronavirus, the impact is singular and greater. Among the causes of the special incidence of deaths from covid, according to the study, is that these are "sudden and unforeseen" compared to others caused by longer ailments, there is no broad family and social support due to confinement measures and the ritual after death is affected by the restriction of capacity at burials.

The impact figure coincides with another recently published by researchers at the University of Cambridge in the British

Medical Journal

(BMJ).

This study points out as collateral victims, especially, “those who have had to face sudden, unexpected deaths or in intensive care units, where their loved ones have suffered serious symptoms, including difficulty breathing and agitation at the end of the lifetime".

"There may be a silent epidemic of pain that we have not yet grasped," a Palliative Medicine doctor admitted to the researchers.

"There may be a silent epidemic of pain that we have not yet grasped," admitted a doctor of Palliative Medicine to researchers at the University of Cambridge.

The study also agrees that "social distancing measures have left some to die alone," and notes that "all these factors mean that the risks of complicated bereavement have become higher during the pandemic."

According to the investigation, the support formulas through the telephone or videoconferences have been "a double-edged sword."

On the one hand, it increased some opportunities to support grief to which children and young people were more receptive.

However, those responsible for palliative care considered them “exhausting” and “difficult to manage”.

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