We Can and Must Help #StopTheSpread

The threat of Coronavirus (COVID-19) is real and spreading. The most vulnerable among us (the elderly, immunocomprised individuals, and those with underlying health conditions) are at high risk of suffering from this virus. Public health experts and the CDC are urging more extreme social distancing, yet too many of us are still not listening. We have to do more.

Now is the critical moment when we, as leaders across the healthcare and life science industries, can take bold action ourselves — like those at Biogen, Eli Lilly, and Takeda who were the first in our industry to tell employees to work from home. At ArcheMedX, we moved swiftly to freeze work travel and enabled all employees to work remotely. We continue to work collectively as a team to slow the spread and prevent a far greater number of deaths by doing our part to “flatten the curve“.

Over the weekend, I joined with CEOs and leaders around the country to adopt the CEO #leadboldly commitment, designed to #stopthespread of COVID-19 in our community. Since Saturday night, more than 1,000 CEOs have pledged on behalf of their companies, and we’ve spread the message to more than 1.5M Americans.

We’ve all pledged to:

• Enable our teams to work from home whenever possible, leading the way on that choice
• Support our frontline workforce, our first responders and our healthcare workers, as they show up for work and fight this on the frontline
• Ask you all to stop hosting or attending voluntary/social public events of any size
• Support small businesses and their employees during this tough time with gift cards and online purchases
• Free up time on our calendars to support our state and local communities as we move through this crisis

This is a clarion call for all healthcare, life science, and technology companies. The time to act is now, not tomorrow, not next week. These recommended steps require hard choices, but this is about protecting our front line healthcare workers and the most vulnerable in our community, and we need to work together.

TAKE IMMEDIATE ACTION. CLICK TO JOIN THE FIGHT.

MY ASK OF YOU —  share #stopthespread across your organization and community today on slack, facebook, twitter, instagram, linkedin, along with emails to corporate leadership, employees, and state and local officials.

WHEN YOU POST  —  don’t forget to share YOUR MOTIVATION to #stopthespread. Share how your organization and/or teams are working diligently to #stopthespread for sick parents & grandparents, for small business owners, for expectant mothers, for gig economy workers, for children, or for our healthcare workers fighting this on the front lines.

To this last point, if we fall short in flattening the curve than we WILL need significantly more ICU beds, respirators, and trained healthcare workers to care for the most vulnerable among us. Please call on your local, state, and congressional leaders to immediately take all necessary steps to dramatically increase the national supply of protective gear, respirators, and critical ICU equipment.

We can prevail by working together. Take action now and make a difference today, and above all, please be safe.