Politicians Rush to Preserve Popular Pandemic-Era Telemedicine
One poll finds that two-thirds of Americans would prefer to get at least some health care online.
Illustration: Xavier Lalanne-Tauzia for Bloomberg Businessweek
Video conferences have long outlived their charm, but one pandemic staple remains popular: the virtual doctor’s visit. Now politicians around the country are racing against deadlines to make sure their constituents aren’t forced back to in-person medicine if they don’t want it.
For months, Jim Des Marais, who has ALS, or Lou Gehrig’s disease, has been video-calling with his specialist at Massachusetts General Hospital instead of making the exhausting three-hour-plus drive to Boston from his home in Vermont. For now, he’s still able to make the drive. “But that won’t last,” says Des Marais, a 60-year-old lawyer. ALS is a degenerative neurological disease. “There will be a point in time when my disease progresses, and traveling will be very difficult for me.”