James Hakim

I stood in front of the Massachusetts State House yesterday, a sunny, windy Martin Luther King Jr day. The state police officers had returned to their vehicle and I breathed deeply, then started reading the names of the COVID dead once more.

Martha stood next to me, a brave family physician trained in the Montefiore residency system, where my mentor Dr Charlie Van Der Horst also trained back in the 1970s. Susan, a primary care internist here in Boston working hard to provide excellent medical care to patients in America’s broken health care system, was on my right, looking off into the distance.

Millions dead from COVID, and the deaths continue to mount. I read the names, one by one. Some names were hard to pronounce, others easier. And then I froze. James Hakim, Zimbabwe.

Dr Hakim is dead? From COVID? I had no idea! Terrible.

I never met Dr Hakim personally, but I heard a about him back in 2011 – 2012, when I was in Mozambique working on the Medical Education Partnership Initiative. Dr Hakim was a legendary South Sudanese – Ugandan physician scientist and leader in the HIV field. Along with others such as Eric Goosby, Chip Schooley, Connie Benson, Fitzhugh Mullen, and Emilia Noormahomed, Dr Hakim was trying to ensure that the physician workforce crisis in Sub-Saharan Africa improved. Residency programs, medical schools, and research infrastructure were being established. It was a hopeful time, despite HIV/AIDS and so many other crises in the region.

We have lost so much during this COVID pandemic.

We must bear witness to our losses, if we are to regain our hope.