On Nov. 27, 2021, Reddit user u/sadmedicalmanthrow posted on the r/offmychest subreddit: "I've been in the medical field for 8 years and I've always done my best to care for my patients, but I'm truly hoping that the new omicron variant fucks people up."
On Nov. 29, the World Health Organization warned that the omicron variant of COVID-19 posed a "very high" risk. It also advised that "preliminary evidence raises the possibility that the variant has mutations that could help it both evade an immune-system response and boost its ability to spread from one person to another," The Associated Press reported.
The score of the Reddit posted reached near the number 10,000 with an 84% upvote percentage. This meant that it was quite popular compared to the vast majority of other content submitted to Reddit that day. The account that posted the message was brand new and was created for the sole purpose of making the post. Such accounts are often referred to as "throwaway" accounts.
The full text of the post read as follows:
I've been in the medical field for 8 years and I've always done my best to care for my patients, but I'm truly hoping that the new Omicron variant fucks people up.
I'm tired, and so is everyone I work with. I was a combat medic, then an LPN, and now I'm a medical technologist for a big clinic. I've always done whatever it was for my patients. I would've taken a bullet, ran through IED infested fields, died for my brothers, got COVID, worked back to back 10 hour shifts because everyone else quit, the fucking list goes on. My urgent care department and ICU are entirely full of unvaccinated fucking morons right now. They're fucking up everything for patients who actually need our care and can't get into the emergency department at our hospital due to them also being swarmed with fuckheads. I've never thought this, but after having over 150 patients a day with only three providers and our nurses crying in our lab, I'm over it. I'm tired of so many patients thinking it's bullshit until they're sitting on deaths door and beginning for treatment. I'm tired of working 60 hour weeks because we're so understaffed.
I've always felt like this was my calling. I've loved patient care and interacting with patients, taking care of them, making sure they felt comfortable and safe, and this last week has truly changed me.
When the news broke out about the Omicron variant, I immediately hoped that it was the most lethal yet, and that it just wrecked havoc on the population, and that was such a horrible thing of me to think and I've never felt like this. I don't even care at this point and I want people who are still doubting the severity of this virus to suffer.
Even writing this I feel bad, but part of me is just over it all. I am emotionally dead after struggling so much for the past two years.
The user who expressed the hope that the omicron variant "fucks people up" did not post information confirming any medical credentials. In a comment, the poster claimed to be located in "upstate New York in a rural but relatively populated area."
We also found subsequent comments from the same user. One of the comments from u/sadmedicalmanthrow was about pay: "I make $25.50 an hour as an MT in my area. The RNs I work with make $30-32/hr at maximum. All of us would take pay cuts if it meant things went back to the way they used to be."
Another comment spoke of seven-day work weeks: "Unfortunately there are only three of us who work at my lab now, Monday through Sunday. We are essentially in agreement that we cannot take vacation without fucking each other over in the long run. Our hospital refuses to hire more lab professionals, so we are fucked. My vacations are my time at home with my family and my one day off per week."
All of this led to chatter on the r/conspiracy subreddit, where some users expressed skepticism that the person who posted the message was actually a medical professional.
We reached out to the account in an attempt to confirm the identity and profession of its owner. We will update this story should we receive a response.