No rare Pnuemonia

Plog Number 234

No rare Pneumonia

Hello Ploggers, how goes it? I know that 😎Life Be Lifin’ Me too! It is a day to day assault on my intelligence whenever I listen to the news. Some stories make me want to argue with the TV. Others make me want to grab certain people and say “See, see. I told you so” LOL! It is maddening sometimes. But the news comes to us and we can draw our own conclusions. In this Plog I want to give you some medical🏥 perspective. I have been an ICU nurse for a long time. I have seen pneumonia more times than I can shake a 🌾stick at.

This brings to mind a recent story about Mary Lou Retton. Many of you have probably heard it already. She was a 19 year old gold medal gymnast back in the day. I can see her flipping like crazy and smiling on a box of Wheaties. She was amazing back in the day. But currently she is a 55 year old woman who is on a ventilator from a “rare” pneumonia. She is said to have no insurance and her daughter has started a “Crowdfunding” type of account. Her net worth is around💰 2 Million. I would have thought she had more money than that. She had a nasty divorce and that may have drained her finances . So, she is in a bad way these days. Many are praying for her recovery, and rightly so, because we know that pneumonia that lands you on a vent is pretty severe. Your lungs can end up scarred and it can take quite awhile to recover. And in the case of many people with pre-existing conditions, it can be lethal. According to her family she is unable to breath on her own.

I have taken care of numerous patients with pneumonia. It is quite common in general. I do not know of any rare or new pneumonias. Pneumonia is caused by 1 of 4 things. Pneumonia is either Bacterial, Viral, Fungal or Aspirational. A differentiation between community versus hospital acquired is a further delineation of the above mentioned types. I have taken care of patients with all of these types of pneumonia. The types of patients include people from all walks of life. It can affect anyone. The course of treatment is similar for everyone, but people respond differently. There are NO new types of pneumonia. The Press Representative for Retton said she had a rare type of pneumonia. I call💩 Bullsh*t. The newest type of viral pneumonia is Covid and it ain't rare!

Lets look at what we know about Retton. She was an outspoken, West Virginia Republican. I have seen pictures of her next to Ronald Reagan. She is known to be somewhat of a conspiracy theorists. Based on that, I doubt that she is vaccinated against any adult conditions. She probably made all of her own health care decisions. I am doubting that she 🚬 smoked. But I am wondering if she has plain old Covid. It makes sense. If she had never been 💉vaccinated or exposed to the Coronavirus and she got exposed to it, she would have gotten a bad case of it. A bad case of Covid landed many people on ventilators. That was the only way to deal with the hypoxia. She is too young for the Pnuemonia or Prevnar vaccine. Those are recommended at age 65. At 55 she wouldn’t be offered it without a pre-existing risk. Chances are she would have refused it. The lack of insurance is a mystery to me. I am fairly sure she insured her home and autos, by law. Do conspiracy theorists shun health insurance?

So I wrote this plog to illuminate people to Pnuemonia and not to trash Retton. I think she is having enough trouble already. I just resented the idea that they tried to push that there is a new and or rare pneumonia. There is not. If there were, it would be major medical news and we would all be freaked out about it. Lets get better stories to cover the easily 👀 uncoverable and RECLAIM!