How Not to Mourn COVID-19

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PSYCHIATRIC VIEWS ON THE DAILY NEWS

It has been hard to know the correct anniversary date of when COVID-19 began, so most commonly it is March 11, which this year would have been the 5-year anniversary of when it was declared a pandemic by the World Health Organization. An alternative might be this past Saturday, March 15, which was Long Covid Awareness Day. Complicating the date is that COVID-19 is still around, but thankfully not as commonly devastating in its repercussions, and that there was a deadly delay in starting to address the pandemic in the United States and elsewhere.

Such anniversaries of harmful events are often hard to process because they can be reminders of what was lost, the trauma, and guilt over what could have been done better. COVID-19 caused over a million deaths in the US, much more than would have been expected from our population compared with many other countries. Moreover, part of the pandemic for us was the disagreements and conflicts over what to do, including vaccination, lockdowns, and blame.

Some of the scapegoating blame is going to Anthony Fauci, MD, the central physician in addressing COVID during the pandemic. Once upon a time, his role was viewed as positive and reflected by a mural of him put up in the Halls of the National Institutes of Health (NIH) upon his retirement in December of 2022. Now, since sometime early this year, his image and words are a discolored empty patch of wall, as described in the Washington Post article titled, “A mural on Tony Fauci was meant to inspire staff. Then NIH took it down.”¹ He still must have personal security. At the same time, scientific funding for NIH has been decreasing and public health threatened.

How different the presidential transition is this time compared with 2020. Back in 2020, President Biden was replacing President Trump, and the developed vaccine was full of promise. Now, in reversal, President Trump has replaced President Biden, and our current concern is measles, bird-flu, and mourning the repercussions of COVID-19.

David Kessler, the protege of the psychiatrist Elizabeth Kubler-Ross, MD, added a sixth stage of grieving, that of finding meaning in what is lost.² That is harder to do when there is disagreement of what was lost and what was the cause. Mainstream media is trying to discuss this challenge, as illustrated in the series of articles in the New York Times: “Public Health Survived the Pandemic. Now It Fights Politics”³; “Science Amid Chaos: What Worked During the Pandemic? What Failed?”⁴; and “Five Years On, Ghosts of a Pandemic We Didn’t Imagine Haunt Us.”⁵ Articles like those in the New York Times can remind us of what we may have forgotten during the pandemic.

Psychiatric Times provided some psychiatric coverage after the pandemic began, including these weekdays columns since September of 2021 and the weekly video series which began in October of 2020. Our COVID anniversary video will appear this Wednesday. Whether it is such media coverage or just pulling up a photo of Dr Fauci, instead of repression or scapegoating, it behooves everyone to assess how well they mourned over these 5 years and what meaning—negative or positive—this pandemic has provided to our lives. Prolonged grief disorder is right around the corners of our mind if we fail to mourn adequately.

Dr Moffic is an award-winning psychiatrist who specialized in the cultural and ethical aspects of psychiatry and is now in retirement and retirement as a private pro bono community psychiatrist. A prolific writer and speaker, he has done a weekday column titled “Psychiatric Views on the Daily News” and a weekly video, “Psychiatry & Society,” since the COVID-19 pandemic emerged. He was chosen to receive the 2024 Abraham Halpern Humanitarian Award from the American Association for Social Psychiatry. Previously, he received the Administrative Award in 2016 from the American Psychiatric Association, the one-time designation of being a Hero of Public Psychiatry from the Speaker of the Assembly of the APA in 2002, and the Exemplary Psychiatrist Award from the National Alliance for the Mentally Ill in 1991. He presented the third Rabbi Jeffrey B. Stiffman lecture at Congregation Shaare Emeth in St. Louis on Sunday, May 19, 2024. He is an advocate and activist for mental health issues related to climate instability, physician burnout, and xenophobia. He is now editing the final book in a 4-volume series on religions and psychiatry for Springer: Islamophobia, anti-Semitism, Christianity, and now The Eastern Religions, and Spirituality. He serves on the Editorial Board of Psychiatric Times.

Reference

1. Diamond D. A mural on Tony Fauci was meant to inspire staff. Then NIH took it down. Washington Post. March 15, 2025. Accessed March 17, 2025. https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2025/03/15/mural-tony-fauci-was-meant-inspire-staff-then-nih-it-down/

2. Kessler D. Finding Meaning: The Sixth State of Grief. Scribner; 2020.

3. Zernike K, Cochrane E, Taft I. Public health survived the pandemic. Now it fights politics. New York Times. March 13, 2025. Accessed March 17, 2025. https://www.nytimes.com/2025/03/13/us/public-health-covid-pandemic-politics.html

4. Mandavilli A. Science amid chaos: what worked during the pandemic? What failed. New York Times. March 14, 2025. Accessed March 17, 2025. https://www.nytimes.com/2025/03/14/health/covid-pandemic-public-health.html

5. Berry D. Five Years On, Ghosts of a Pandemic We Didn’t Imagine Haunt Us. New York Times. March 15, 2025. Accessed March 17, 2025. https://www.nytimes.com/2025/03/15/us/pandemic-five-years-dan-barry.html