The first mention of “pandemic” in this publication came exactly 100 years before the Covid-19 pandemic crashed into 2020.
Dr. Harry Plotz sounded the alarm in 1920 after returning to the U.S. from Poland, where he had studied the typhus plague killing Europeans with its terrifying mortality rate of 25%. “If the epidemic spreads to other countries … there will be a pandemic, just as in the case of influenza,” Plotz warned.
Typhus doesn’t transmit from person to person, but lice easily spread typhus bacteria in crowded living quarters. Plotz noted that a British colleague “had counted 30,000 lice and 200,000 nits on one man.” The doctor proposed that developed countries invest significant resources and funding to stamp it out.
A pandemic that happened a century ago is ancient history — right? Quaint. Yet here we are, a mere five years after the start of our own modern-day pandemic, and some of us are acting as if it was a moment in history, too. It’s human nature to put upsetting or traumatic events behind us. But it’s been hard to move on as the lingering effects of the Covid pandemic still … well, linger.
In March 2020, there was no escaping it. We were stunned by fast-moving events, maniacally stocking groceries and toilet paper, scrambling for hand sanitizer, shopping for cute (and ineffective, it turns out) cloth masks on Etsy, and teeming with anxiety and dread. The streets were eerily quiet. Our grown children came home.
At J., we transitioned to working remotely and reported on the Jewish community as it navigated this bizarre and disruptive new reality.
Our first story about Covid, on Feb. 28, 2020, was a rundown of how Jewish organizations were responding to initial reports about the coronavirus. The buzz phrase at the time was “wait and see,” though at least two trips to Israel were already canceled or postponed.
At S.F. Congregation Emanu-El, Rabbi Beth Singer announced that on Shabbat, pre-sliced challah would be passed out after the Hamotzi blessing, “instead of each person ripping off a piece and handing it to the next person.” Guidelines from the Orthodox Rabbinical Council of America included a recommendation not to kiss mezuzahs or the Torah.
Congregation Beth Am in Los Altos Hills was the first to cancel events, we reported on March 5. Others were “monitoring the situation carefully.”
By the end of March, caution wasn’t enough.
“This is the most serious medical crisis I have ever seen in my whole life,” said Sharon Goldfarb, a nurse educator in Marin County, who worked on-site after both 9/11 and Hurricane Katrina. “I’m working 16 hours a day, seven days a week. This is a crisis beyond any crisis.”
Senior facilities were hardest hit by the virus, which spread quickly among vulnerable residents. The San Francisco Campus for Jewish Living, the Reutlinger Community in Danville and S.F.’s Rhoda Goldman Plaza all faced large numbers of cases. In late 2020, they were dealing with full-on outbreaks — and the subsequent deaths. Nearly half of the 300-some residents at the SFCJL tested positive in December that year.
Jewish life was transformed. Synagogues, the center of institutional Jewish life, understood their role and hurried to master a technology that allowed congregants to stay connected with a click. “Having a Zoom platform means people can see each other, and hear each other’s voices, and chat,” said Rabbi Mordecai Miller of Congregation Beth Ami in Santa Rosa. “We have absolutely created a Zoom community.”
Many organizations struggled to adapt. Sinai Memorial Chapel limited services to graveside only, with a small number of guests. JCCs across the Bay Area lost millions in revenue as visitors and regular users stopped coming. Layoffs followed. A torrent of fundraising appeals arrived from every corner of the community. Generous donations came from private funders such as Taube Philanthropies and the Koum Family Foundation, and agencies including the S.F.-based Jewish Community Federation and Endowment Fund, Jewish Family and Children’s Services and Hebrew Free Loan. But they couldn’t completely stop the bleeding.
Jewish day schools were caught up in closures too, with “distance learning” taking the place of in-class instruction. Parents pined for their restless children to return to the classroom, with one mother at Brandeis School of San Francisco describing Zoom school as “worse than nothing. It was like reduced-fat cheese. You’re not getting the good stuff.”
Teachers faced multiple challenges working online. “It’s a really hard needle to thread in balancing the academic well-being, social well-being and everyone’s physical health,” said Jewish Community High School of the Bay science teacher Cecily Burrill.
Summer camps, including Tawonga, Newman, Eden Village West and Ramah NorCal, promised a respite, only to end up canceling all of their 2020 overnight programs.
Jewish heroes and givers emerged during the crisis, too: local doctors and nurses who served on the front lines, health professionals who took care of seniors, everyday people who delivered food and crafted face shields for medical workers, teens who made weekly phone calls to isolated seniors, donors who supported the homeless, Jews of color and other less-funded groups, and of course every parent and teacher.
In late 2020, news that the vaccines were ready gave us hope. By the end of January 2021, 92% of residents at the S.F. Campus for Jewish Living plus staff had received their first doses. The same was true at the other senior facilities. Vaccinations were administered widely throughout the spring.
The rules started to ease in June 2021.
“The mood was one of delight,” said Sherith Israel’s executive director, describing the return of in-person services. “People were just so happy to be together. There were a lot of reunions going on.” But that was short-lived. Soon the delta variant appeared, and we were back in our masks and canceling in-person gatherings, including High Holiday services for a second year.
“People are of the mindset that the pandemic is over,” Dr. John Swartzberg, an infectious disease specialist with the UC Berkeley-UCSF Joint Medical Program, told J. in July 2021. “That is anything but the case.”
The omicron variant showed up at the end of 2021, complicating a return to normal once again.
Five years on, the pandemic is over, but we’re still not “over” the pandemic. It has changed us. And the cold fact is that more than 7 million people worldwide died from Covid-19, according to the World Health Organization, 1.2 million of them Americans.
Beyond the devastating, deadly toll of the virus, we lost so much in the day to day: time with friends and family, graduations, travel, social interactions (especially for teens and young adults), lifecycle rituals, Jewish holidays. But there were gains, too. We had a rare opportunity to slow down, reflect on what was truly important to us and see firsthand the essential role community plays in our lives. For that, at least, we are grateful.