An Urgent Calling: The Intersection of Hospitality & Health Care
The current global pandemic has exposed a devastating disconnection: Two industries, hospitality and health care, that have been living worlds apart, yet now find themselves in desperate need of one another.
Upon initial reflection, one might think of these two sectors as completely distinct, unrelatable, and so fundamentally different that it would be too difficult to find a way to get along. And yet, if you pause just long enough to see how lost in fact we both are alone, arguably you cannot help but take note that we have more to gain in coming together than we do in living apart.
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Covid-19 has been the most challenging of unwanted guests for both hospitality and health care. It’s arrival unexpected, it’s length of stay unknown, and it’s demands completely unreasonable. In its presence, it has revealed some horrific shortcomings – notably our lack of preparedness and our inability to continue fulfilling our most fundamental shared purpose - to serve.
So how do we move beyond this current global state of relative paralysis? How do we relieve the pressure on the millions of exhausted global health care workers? How do we generate opportunity for the millions of hospitality professionals that have lost their jobs? And how do we restructure the framework, so we don’t find ourselves down and out and all alone again?
The calling is urgent: hospitality and health care most converge. We must come together, sit at the same table, learn from and support one another. To serve, to be in service of, is at the heart of both of our work. A new collaboration is required in order for us to get back to the work we love.
SERVICE
The labor gap is obvious. The near complete arrest of international travel and the dramatic disruption to domestic tourism has left over 100 million global hospitality and tourism professionals unemployed[1]. Conversely, the need for healthcare workers is soaring. According to a recent study by Mercer that identifies critical workforce gaps, demand for healthcare workers in the US will outpace supply by 2025, if it hasn’t already.[2]
In the short-term, borrowed talent is available. As hospitality professionals, we can lend our soft skills, support on the fringe, if only easing the sheer burden of volume on overstretched front-line workers. We can be an extra set of hands, a warm smile, someone to fetch a cup of coffee - little things that in today’s current environment could go a long way.
In the mid to long term, there are rumblings that we hope evolve into a rallying cry, of a more robust aggregation – a renaissance of sorts – a re-birth so to speak of the face of traditional medical care. The pandemic has highlighted just how reliant we all are on the health care industry yet just how overlooked it has been. Bridging the gulf between our two sectors would undoubtedly support and uplift us both.
HEALTHY FACILITIES
Alarming stories from several of the worlds most developed countries, documenting the dismal state of many hospitals and long-term care homes, have been revealed. Beyond dated, buildings are often lacking basic infrastructure to support their inhabitants. The WHO reports that a staggering 1 in 4 health care facilities world-wide lack basic water services[3].
On the contrary, our industry is home to some of the most beautiful, well-appointed buildings across the globe. Iconic properties are a feature in almost every major urban centre, often designed by the most pioneering, the most talented. Recent movements have seen incredible advancements with design moving well beyond the aesthetic into practices that measurably impact the health of the built environment.
Indoor air quality is a prime example. Under a lens like never before, we are seeing some incredible advancements in features that are explicitly meant to mitigate the risk of respiratory illness and microbe transmission, including coronavirus. In communal buildings, upgrading the HVAC systems to allow for compartmentalization between units or zones as well as the implementation of robust filtration systems that are capable of capturing bacteria and fine particles has become a priority.
More simplistic upgrades would naturally arise if a level of attention to design in health care was even remotely enhanced to be more closely considered as it is in hospitality. Access to fresh air, humidity control and basic design strategies centered around user experience - such as lighting, material and finish selection would be attended to. If even elementary yet widespread, a level of comfort would be brought to these care environments that is so desperately needed.
INTENDED END USE & EXPERIENCE
New collaborations amongst our two sectors have begun emerging in recent months, a hopeful sign of early connections and conversations that could evolve into fulfilling long-term relationships.
Vacant hotels in urban centres around the world continue to be repurposed into designated quarantine facilities, fulfilling a mutual urgency and great void in both hospitality and health care. In recent months, empty conference rooms and convention halls have begun their conversion into mass vaccination centres. Serving acute and immediate needs at this time, one of the many unfortunate realities of this pandemic is that the physical, mental and emotional repercussions, particularly on those that have battled the virus first-hand, will linger over time. Similarly, our industry is not poised to simply bounce back, with any degree of resumption to normal travel levels not predicted until at least 2024[4].
A more permanent proposal is required. We have millions of empty hotel rooms. There are millions who are struggling, have suffered, and are in need. So, can we come together, forge a meaningful, more longstanding partnership? What might it look like if numerous hotels and resorts fundamentally repositioned themselves under the union of hospitality and health care – transforming into rehabilitation and recovery residences, purposefully serving those that have battled COVID, those that suffered great loss and the staggering number of front-line health care workers that themselves are suffering a devastating mental health crisis[5].
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The time is now to leverage our strengths, inspire collaboration, come together so we can again fulfil our essential common purpose – to serve. It is up to all of us to heed the calling, and with any degree of luck we will set a microcosmic example of the tremendous benefits that can be realized when focusing more on what we have in common than on what sets us apart. Let this be just the beginning of a new life-long love affair between hospitality and health care.
Authored by Jennifer Findlay, for CoStar and Hotel News Now; Spring 2021
[1]Statista: https://www.statista.com/statistics/1104835/coronavirus-travel-tourism-employment-loss/
[2]Mercer: https://www.mercer.us/our-thinking/career/demand-for-healthcare-workers-will-outpace-supply-by-2025.html
[3]World Health Organization: https://www.who.int/news/item/14-12-2020-almost-2-billion-people-depend-on-health-care-facilities-without-basic-water-services-who-unicef
[4]International Air Transport Association: https://www.iata.org/en/pressroom/pr/2020-07-28-02/
[5]Bloomberg: https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2021-01-19/mental-health-in-the-pandemic-how-are-you-coping-in-covid-s-war-zone