I'm becoming seriously fatigued over the whole COVID-19 situation. We had a staff meeting at work this week and I was basically told that I'm going to be reassigned from the food safety side to the epi side in order to help with contact tracking of PUIs/suspected cases, as well as take on a fair chunk of the phone calls from the general public. **** happens. I get it, and I also understand that I got hired on at a weird time. I probably wouldn't mind so much but I'm the only staff member out of the nine of us that this is happening to and it's pushing back my training, which is already behind schedule, even further. I only started this job last week and I don't feel remotely prepared to do my actual listed duties, let alone all of these new tasks being put on me.
And people are so nasty about it, too. I understand that they're scared and many of them simply don't understand how these things work, but it's supremely frustrating to have to brunt the angry phone calls of 50+ panicked people who are demanding tests but aren't even showing the correct symptoms/don't meet the criteria/aren't at substantial risk of complications. I'm hoping that the funds that come through as a result of the emergency declaration today helps a bit, but we are so damn short on test kits that the bar in order to get tested, at least at our office, is very high. It's aggravating and we wish we could test more, but that's just how it is here right now. Then I get even more calls from people who are irate that the state's official COVID-19 information hotline is down or swamped with extreme call volume, like that's our fault somehow. Among other things; I literally got a call from someone trying to "report" their neighbor with a mild cough because "he's foreign". Honestly, maybe 10% of the calls I've fielded have been about something of actual, legitimate concern. I try to help to the best of my ability (which isn't much; we're so underfunded and in want of more supplies and staff that we're largely toothless in much of this) but almost always get vitriol in return.
Then, when I get home or go out in public to do whatever, guess what current event everyone wants to talk about? On SDN it doesn't bother me so much because we're all pretty knowledgeable and level-headed, comparatively. IRL, though... damn, I wish people would understand that I just do not want to bring that baggage home with me after dealing with it all day at work. I ignore the topic when it's brought up but people seemingly aren’t picking up the hints. I don't want to talk to anyone, much less family who spout whatever silly nonsense they stumbled upon on Facebook that day.
This all sucks. I like public health as a subject, and I was excited to start this job, but now I feel like I'm just not at all cut out for the reality of it and that I'm letting it stress me out more than it probably reasonably should. I think back to my original educational and career trajectory and wish I'd stuck with that instead of going down the path I did; sitting at a desk alone translating text all day, knowing that no other lives are potentially on the line, sounds like a dream right now.