The War for Kindness: Building Empathy in a Fractured World

Content Warning: The Chapter 5 Summary mentions infant death.

Zaki opens Chapter 5 by recounting his own experiences with the intensive care nursery (ICN) at the Benioff Children’s Hospital, located within the University of California’s San Francisco Medical Center. He and his wife spent days at the ICN after their daughter, Alma, suffered a stroke during her birth. Zaki expresses deep gratitude for Alma’s neonatologist and the unit’s associate medical director, Liz Rogers. Liz, alongside other doctors, nurses, and staff, showed Zaki and his wife profound empathy, something they do for all families. Zaki describes them as “empathic superheroes” (95), but he raises several questions: “Can they possibly sustain this rhythm and, if so, for how long? What does their care cost” (95)?

To address these questions, Zaki returns to the ICN as a researcher nearly two years after Alma’s birth. One of the workers he observes is Melissa Liebowitz, the unit’s newest doctor who shadows Liz. Melissa and Liz oversee Francisco, who was born 12 weeks premature. He suffers from necrotizing enterocolitis, a fatal condition which causes brain hemorrhage and failing intestines. The team decides to operate on Francisco, which is unsuccessful.