Thank you frontline workers

As a Paramedic, my coworkers and I are on the frontlines in this unprecedented time. Our mantra has quickly become: "we are at work for you, so stay home for us."

That is a testament to the social distancing and self-quarantine that needs to happen to "flatten the curve," and hopefully allow us to get ahead of this. If we cannot slow the spike in cases down by heeding this advice, our health care system will become totally overwhelmed.

Our health care and emergency systems run smoothly on a normal day-to-day operational basis, but I think we can all agree that these are not "normal" times. Practicing social distancing is the most important thing you can do for your community right now.

That said, I want to emphasize that staying socially connected during these times is so important for our mental health. I personally have taken the opportunity to use one of the many video calling apps available to chat with my friends. The other night we had a bunch of us on the same video chat playing games and having many laughs. I can honestly say it was such a relief to connect with them in this time and was such a great time. We are all looking forward to doing it again soon. We, Paramedics, want to do the best we can to provide emergency care to our community, and we want to come home healthy and safe to our own families at the end of this. We need your help, so we can help you." – Mo Bro Jon Harper

We want to take this time to thank all of the courageous first responders, doctors, nurses, and so many others who find themselves on the frontlines of this public health crisis. We owe each and every one of you a tremendous amount of gratitude.

No matter who you are or what you do, it’s more important than ever to stay socially connected. That’s why we’re pressing pause on our In the Barber Chair series to tell you the stories from our community in the new situations they find themselves. From the frontline workers who are risking their lives to keep us safe to the ways that people are staying connected; our Mo community continues to amaze us. It’s time to rally together. We need to make the call to look out for ourselves and each other; we can get through this.