While on door-to-door outreach with the Summer Medical Institute this week in Kensington, my group measured a man’s blood pressure which screened “emergent high”, meaning he needed to seek immediate medical help. He wasn’t presently experiencing any symptoms of hypertension like chest pain or headaches, but as we explained the risk of stroke and kidney damage, he realized he needed a physician’s help TODAY. The consequences of waiting until he felt symptoms could be organ damage, or even death. So, like any sensible fellow, he went to get help.
The lack of symptoms did not stop the gentleman from seeking treatment. He believed us when we told him that he had a serious, chronic illness on hand. It takes a measure of faith to trust something not apparent to you. My experience thus far at SMI in Philadelphia has alerted me that our city and country can harbor pathogens without manifesting symptoms. We know that parts of our society are sick when children are born into neighborhoods devoid of opportunity and are surrounded by crime and physically maladaptive lifestyles. A society should work together like the body – individual cells and organs cooperating for the overall benefit of everybody. If a part of the body is attacking itself, the head must correct this fighting or put the whole body at risk. Perhaps dysfunctional pathogens go unnoticed in our society because we are not close enough to the suffering part of the body. Can we afford to not be close enough to notice suffering? What pathogens could the “head” of our society not notice? Ignoring an illness does not resolve it. We must address the pathogen, like the man with hypertension, even if it means expensively treating it, because ignorance heightens the likelihood that when symptoms present, the outcome will be swift and final.
– Ben Lampe