Society failed Dr Jackie Stone

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Society failed Dr Jackie Stone, the COVID hero

By Dr E V Rapiti, Cape Town, October 6, 2024

Summary: In this article, Dr Rapiti pays tribute to the late Dr Jackie Stone from Zimbabwe, who saved millions of lives during COVID but tragically ended her life after she was stripped off her licence by the Zimbabwean medical board.

Yesterday, people from all over the world and from all walks of life were hit by the harsh and shocking news that the vibrant, intelligent, humble and caring daughter of Africa, COVID hero and visionary of an alternative healthcare model for Africa, ended her life tragically and suddenly.

I, like many of you, am trying to come to terms with this shocking news.

As someone with a keen interest in mental health, I vividly recall contacting Jackie when she was about to appear before the Zimbabwean medical board for a disciplinary hearing for saving the lives of millions of people and I asked her if I could arrange a fund to cover the costs of her impending court cases.

Jackie, the typical stoic that she was, reassured me that she was fine. In hindsight, I am sorry that I did not persevere on my instincts and come to her aid.

Today, as I reflect upon her death and the way she ended it, I can only imagine what pain and suffering she endured after she was callously stripped of her licence by the shameless cold-hearted board members, who didn't give a hoot about the millions of lives that Jackie saved in Zimbabwe and the rest of the world. She became the revered hero all over the world for her simple, inexpensive approach to tame COVID but that didn't seem to matter at all to the ignorant captured members of the medical board.

She achieved this mammoth feat in Zimbabwe,  when patients in countries with the most amount of resources and  most sophisticated technology, were dying in droves.

A normal society and an untainted medical board would have bestowed the highest medal of honour on Dr Stone for her unselfish dedication and sacrifices to save humanity from one of the deadliest contrived pandemics in the entire history of the world,

Instead of celebrating Jackie as a hero, her dubious medical board colluded with the equally dubious judiciary and ruthlessly stripped her of her medical licence after she futilely tried 27 times to defend herself to a board of members.  These members didn't have a clue about how to treat COVID yet they had the temerity to try this hero.  It leaves me to wonder if this board ever really cared about the lives of ordinary Zimbabweans; if they did, Jackie would have still been with us today,  and rightfully walking down the hall of fame.

When Jackie was stripped of her licence with absolutely no chance of regaining it, the chilling reality of fulfilling her lifelong ambition to serve the poor desperate citizens of Africa, Asia and South America must have hit her like a ton of bricks and destroyed her spirits and her soul.

From that moment on, her entire life must have been shattered. She was stripped of her livelihood, her dignity and consequently her will to live.

It must have been a terribly hard blow for her, from being a totally independent person, to suddenly to join the ranks of the millions unemployed Zimbabweans and  find ways to obtain the basic necessities of life for herself and a family to survive.

It must have been a sad, depressing and lonely life for someone like her, who was bubbling with ideas and enthusiasm to create a new system of healthcare for  developing countries to suddenly discover that she has become an overnight non-entity.

I can identify with her, after being in practice for over four decades, how important it is to continue practicing the art of medicine during one's lifetime. Doctors survive and thrive when they feel relevant and are allowed the freedom to contribute to the wellbeing of the people that they serve.

Doctors, whose entire lives are immersed in their  work, lead very lonely lives. Their patients are often the only people that they can communicate with, apart from their families. This is especially true in the discipline of family medicine, where you get to know your clients like the back of your palm through years of association with them.

The sad reality is that,  all the grateful people, who heaped their praises on Jackie when she was in the frontline saving millions of lives at a huge cost to her health, have all receded into their cocoons and Jackie was left to brew in her sadness, totally alone, contemplating an empty future, void of any meaning..

Jackie's sad and tragic end should be a grim reminder to medical professionals all over the world, that we are highly vulnerable to taking our own lives when we are denied the right to earn a living especially on totally unfair grounds.

It does not mean that, because we heal our patients from physical and mental illnesses that we are not vulnerable to heart attacks and mortifying depression. We, too, are made of the same flesh and blood as our patients. We need to take care of ourselves in order to serve to the best of our ability.

It should not come as a surprise that doctors, and especially psychiatrists, have the highest suicide rates compared to  people in  all other professions.

The medical associations are aware of it but they just turn a blind eye to it and send a bouquet of flowers to the grieving families.

Sending flowers alone is not enough. We need to be proactive and set up an organisation or platform for doctors with serious life issues and obtain help.

It is clear  that the world failed Jackie and doctors like her, terribly, for not anticipating her needs and not coming to rescue. It's the least that society could have done for this brave hero, who sacrificed so much, gave so much and asked for so little in return.

Having worked in a Gestapo COVID era, l will never forget the prevailing fear at the time if you were a doctor, who tried to save your patients using unconventional methods or dared to speak against the narrative. We lived in the constant fear that the dictatorial captured authorities were going to swamp on you and immediately charge you as an abominable criminal, whilst  the despicable media was waiting on the wings to annihilate you from the face of the earth.

I had one such experience with an NPR journalist, who came to me like an angel, took my story and like a typical castrated journalist thug, dancing to the tune of his superiors, described me in the most disparaging manner as a horse-doctor.

Yes, Dr Stone went through hell, privately. Typical of her stoic personality, she never shared it with anyone.

I have the greatest admiration for her as a person and her contribution to society in the world's darkest era in its history. We have lost a great doctor and a great humanitarian with a great vision to help Africa.

Apart from being a great doctor and tutor, Jackie was an avid student, hence her respect and willingness to have people from alternative disciplines like Ayurvedic medicine and traditional African medicine to share their knowledge freely on her campus zoom meetings

Out of my gratitude and in recognition for her sterling contribution to society, I would like us to set up a Dr Jackie Stone foundation to assist her family for the immense sacrifices Jackie made for the benefit of the whole of society.

We cannot bring her back but let us honour her in her absence by helping her family, who paid the price for Jackie's unwavering commitment and sacrifices to help society.

Finally, I not only mourn the death of the great hero, Dr Jackie Stone and many doctors like her, I also mourn the fact that we are living in an era when the world has lost its moral compass.

We are living in a time when selfish academics traded their ethics for a few ounces of silver and destroyed the lives of so many ethical caring doctors like the late Dr Jackie Stone.

It's time for honest citizens to rise and make their voices heard to regain our moral compass.

Let Jackie's tragic death serve as a catalyst for society to get out of its slumber and act to save the world from further depravity and sickening decay.

Dr E V Rapiti

Cape Town

Sunday 6, 2024

Dr Rapiti is a family physician with over Forty years of experience, working in the densely populated suburb of Mitchells Plain,Cape. He has treated over 3000 COVID patients with a 99.97% success rate. He often shared a platform with Dr Stone to share their medical experiences with the public.