My great aunt Verna was the eldest of seven Irish-American sisters born in western Oklahoma during the decade straddling the arrival of the 20th century. Aside from my grandmother, the youngest of this brood, she was the favorite of my brother and I. Verna believed in greeting each day with a breakfast built on several scoops of vanilla ice cream smothered in freshly cut fruit. I like to believe this ritual may be why she outlived all her sisters, buried three husbands and nearly survived into the 21st century.

I am scheming to purchase a gallon of the finest vanilla for our freezer to honor her memory as Cindy and I ‘shelter in place’ over the next few weeks – although my motivation is admittedly more akin to the warning, “Life is uncertain. Eat dessert first!” Once, when still a little boy, I told Verna how much a Victorian footstool supported on four scimitar legs fascinated me. She never forgot that brief conversation and unexpectedly left that stool to me in her estate.

I am hoping that Colorado can better weather the difficult times ahead by embracing our shared destiny, rejecting the findings of a Wall Street Journal poll showing many voters divided along partisan lines regarding the risks of the corona virus. COVID-19 is a non-partisan vandal. It targets neither Democrats nor Republicans but infects everyone in its path with agnostic glee. I’ve been pleased and impressed with the measured demeanor of Jared Polis. During his first year in office he showed signs of proving a better than average Governor, but his sensible approach to protecting public health has been reassuring. It’s likely inevitable that Colorado’s health care system will soon undergo a logistical and fiscal battering, highlighted with tales of personal courage and heroism. It will be our doctors and nurses who suffer a disproportionate toll, just as was true in 1918.

In a perverse way, the corona virus may force a rethinking of the public option insurance legislation left pending in the recessed Legislative session. The decision to fund discounted coverage for just those 8% of Coloradans who participate in the self-insured market by capping hospital reimbursements follows the Sutton rule: “That’s where the money is.” While offering a worthy benefit to rural communities with a single insurance plan, there is the very real danger that forcing hospitals to subsidize these plans alone when the entire industry is overpriced may look a little churlish – especially so, after hospitals and their staffs have undertaken life-saving labors on behalf of those who are soon be infected.

Democratic President Woodrow Wilson botched the Spanish flu, much as the Trump administration is botching COVID-19, each contributing to thousands of unnecessary deaths. It is a shame it has taken a pandemic to demonstrate why universal health care isn’t as much about socialism as it is about national security. Each requires soldiers. Only the enemy differs.

In my lifetime health costs have tripled their drain on the American economy, while eroding the quality of care and shrinking average lifespans. Once upon a cheaper time, Doctors made house calls. Imagine that. When the COVID-19 epidemic explodes, costs are likely to run into the hundreds of billions of dollars. As the national economy staggers out from beneath this burden, the health care debate at every state Capitol is likely to prove far different than it was just last week. There will be wounds that require binding and scars that will heal slowly.

The chances of leadership from Congress are vanishingly small. Re-opening the Colorado cost conversation may well be in order. Public attitudes are sure to have changed. Should hospital Presidents be our highest paid CEOs? Should pharmaceutical reps be our highest paid salesmen? Should hospitals be our most profitable service providers? Next time, and there will be a next time, who should be responsible for guaranteeing an adequate reserve of ventilators, respirators and protective gear?

Counting on Washington feels riskier than looking out for ourselves. In the meantime, don’t forget to check on your neighbors. Can you pick up a prescription for the elderly widow who lives alone? Maybe she would like some ice cream.

Miller Hudson is a public affairs consultant and a former legislator. He can be reached at mnhwriter@msn.com.