Diversity Rules Magazine

Erica Jamieson, a Bri sh writer state- side since 2013. Currently based in Vieques, PR, af- ter the pandemic grounded global travel plans through Asia and beyond. A lover of all things aqua c, you'll find her snorkelling the Caribbean reefs when not typing away on a laptop. . For part- me Mor- ris resident, Dr. Rick O'Keefe, working through the fear of COVID-19 has raised ques ons about his youth, and how he responded to living and working through the HIV/AIDS crisis as a young gay doctor. A er over a year living under threat of the coro- navirus, it finally feels like life for some is creeping back to normalcy. Nearly 60% of New York adult resi- dents have received at least one dose of the vaccine [h ps://covid19vaccine.health.ny.gov/covid-19-vac- cine-tracker], and the announcement that NYC in- door restaurants can seat up to 75% capacity brings the city in line with regula ons across the state. Rick O'Keefe, MD, has had property in Maple Grove since 2005. A 61 year-old family prac ce doctor work- ing at a university student health center in New York City, Rick spent the en re spring and much of the summer living in Otsego county while his job shi ed to be fully remote. Though the move upstate helped calm some of Rick's nerves, he remembers feeling paralysed by the fear of COVID-19 during the virus' early days. "The fear was that I was going to die. We went from knowing that [COVID-19] was around, to the en re city and state shu ng down," he remembered, "You could hear an ambulance every fi een minutes going by." Among colleagues in the medical services field, there were rumours that ven lators were running out, and that ra oned resources would be priori sed for pa- ents under 60 years old. One day, Rick received no- ce that he could be deployed to a Cough and Cold Center or Emergency Room to help treat the rising number of sick, poten ally pu ng himself at risk in a healthcare system without adequate supplies. "That, for me, was scary… that made me feel vulnerable," he recalled. Throughout his life, Rick has found ways to manage and move through fear. In his youth, he survived the HIV epidemic, which claimed nearly six in ten lives of the 774,000 people diagnosed with AIDS between 1981 and 2000 in the United States [h ps://www. cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/mm5021a2. htm]. As a young doctor, and also an out, gay man, Rick experienced the crisis both urgently and personally. A er comple ng the Family Medicine Residency fol- lowing medical school in 1987, he co-founded the Health Outreach To Teens (HOTT) program with the Community Health Project (now Callen Lorde) in New York. The health ini a ve uses a mobile medical clinic to serve LGBTQ+ street youth across the city. "My life and work were really almost one," Rick ex- plained of the me, "I lived in the community that was affected, I was working in the community that was affected. I was part of the community pushing for change with the government and within health- care. Everything was very urgent and rela ve." This immediacy helped him keep the fear of HIV at bay. Looking back, rather than fear, he remembers what he lost. "I remember going to lots of funerals. 4 | Diversity Rules Magazine | June 2021 How One Local (Gay) Doctor Learned to Overcome Fear in the Face of COVID-19 By Erica Jamieson

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