05/05/2020

Dr. Roizen Shares Advice on Re-entering Society Safely During COVID-19 Pandemic

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Article reprinted with permission from Cleveland Jewish News

by McKENNA CORSON | STAFF REPORTER

Dr. Michael Roizen, chief wellness officer emeritus at the Cleveland Clinic, stressed physical distancing, hand washing, maintaining a healthy lifestyle and other less commonly known measures to best protect yourself and others from COVID-19 as states start to re-open.

He discussed the precautions in a virtual talk hosted by the Jewish Federation of Cleveland May 4. The free event drew hundreds of attendees across the nation and was moderated by Dan Zelman, vice chairman of the Federation.

“You protecting you is different from you protecting others,” Roizen said.

When it comes to protecting others, Roizen advised physically distancing at least six feet away from others; wearing cloth or N-95 masks; quarantining if symptoms like cough, fever and diarrhea arrive; and testing and quarantining to shed the virus.

“Physical distancing and N-95 masks work for both you and others,” Roizen said. “If you’re over 70 or have one of those co-morbidities, you should really consider making sure you physically distance 12 feet at most times and use an N-95 mask until we get a vaccine or an effective treatment.”

To protect yourself from the virus, Roizen encouraged physically distancing at least 12 feet away from others in public; staying in isolation as much as possible; hand washing, especially before touching one’s face or eating; wearing personal protective equipment including gloves, hats and masks; and maintaining a healthy lifestyle with a balanced diet, eight hours of sleep a night, stress management, exercise and more.

Less commonly referred to, he also urged heating or reheating meals that weren’t cooked at home at 140 degrees for 15 minutes to kill any possibility of the virus in food.

“This virus not only gets you through the respiratory tract, but through the (gastrointestinal) tract,” Roizen said. “In fact, almost 80% of people have GI symptoms now. If you take food out from a take-out place, you should really reheat it before you eat it because the virus lives in that food and can cause you disease.”

Roizen then answered questions from the audience, ranging from groceries to children to mail.

A detail that came up in almost every answer was that unless someone was over 70, dealing with uncontrollable co-morbidities like hypertension, cancer, chronic kidney disease requiring dialysis, respiratory disease, diabetes or obesity, one may be fine to safely re-enter society.

“If you’re under 60, you’re at very low risk of getting a severe problem from this,” Roizen said.

If a treatment isn’t soon discovered, Roizen warned of an increase in “diseases of despair” such as drug and alcohol abuse, and suicide.

Experts believe there is a negative correlation between the virus and warm weather, so while there could be some relief from the virus over the summer, a fall return is plausible, he said.

“If we don’t have a treatment that is very effective, it will come back sometime between Sept. 15 and Oct. 15,” Roizen said. “But our hospitals will be much better prepared, our health system much better prepared for overflow if we need it. We’ll have much more knowledge about the immunity by then, and hopefully we’ll have one or more treatments, or combinations of treatments, that decrease the risk of this for those over 70 by 80% or 90%. Our mayors, governor and city and county officials will have learned and be informed of what we can do so that we’ll be much better prepared by the fall.”

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