Dear Fellow Members of the Bergen County Jewish Community,

As physicians living and/or working in the Bergen County Jewish community, we would like to reach out to you, our friends and neighbors, regarding the Covid-19 pandemic, and express our concern as we approach Pesach.

We commend the Rabbinical Council of Bergen County (RCBC) for their unprecedented leadership in fighting the global pandemic through social distancing, and temporarily shutting down Jewish cultural and religious life. We salute the leadership in our townships, who mandated quarantines ahead of state and federal efforts. And we are proud of all of you, who have held fast under extraordinary and historic times, to do what is so unnatural- to close our doors, avoid synagogue, our local restaurants as well as other public venues.

However, we are extremely concerned that as a community, our resolve is faltering, just as social distancing is beginning to yield dividends. Many of us are on the front lines of this pandemic, and we anticipate that there will be an influx of more serious cases over the next few weeks. Everyone by now is aware of the critical shortages of intensive care capabilities, PPEs and ventilators. What we are begging you to understand, is that failure to “flatten the curve” will have real human consequences. Not only will we fail to adequately care for Covid patients, but we will be less prepared to take care of all of the other acute medical and surgical needs, which have not gone on vacation.

Pesach is rapidly approaching, and many in our communities have made plans to host elderly parents and grandparents. We understand the complexity which underlies each one of these individual decisions, but urge you to reconsider these plans, if for no other reason, than to protect the ones you love. Even hosting our young asymptomatic children- even if previously quarantined themselves- could be hazardous. In the absence of widespread testing, it is impossible to discern who has the disease and who does not.

Failure to distance over Pesach, we fear, will lead to endangering your families and communities. It could also endanger our lives, the medical professionals who are your friends and neighbors.

Thank you once again for so bravely soldiering on in these historically difficult times. We wish you a Chag Kasher V’Sameach- a happy and more importantly, a healthy Pesach.

Michael Akerman

Robert Alter

Gary Alweiss

Richard Andron

Joanne Aranoff

Jeffrey Aronoff

Ben Aronoff

Yitzhack Asulin

Jay Babich

Nava Bak

Howard Baruch

Angeli Batista

Kelly Bautista

Luis Belmudez

Michael Bittner

Aliza Black

Dana Cernea

Norman Chideckel

Wen Ching Liao

Brenda Choi

Moshe Cohn

Susan Condrin

Christine Cumarasamy

Adi Davidov

Roy Davidovitch

Neela DeSoyza

Ezra Dweck

Ari Eckman

Amanda Eis

Avigayil Elkin

Renee Epstein

Elana Espinosa

David Feigenblum

Daniel Fein

Janet Fein

Alexander Fein

Amnon Fein

David Felig

Naomi Feuer

Andrew Fink

Matthew Finn

Richard Finkel

Tanya Fooks

Natan Fooks

Zev Frankel

Nancy Fremed

Eric Fremed

Harvey Friedman

Howard Friedman

Samuel Friedman

Steven Furer

Vivi Furer

Miranda Garcia

Mark Gardenswartz

Glen Gejerman

Ari Geliebter

Rebecca Geliebter

Dana Gellis

Howard Geyer

Rebecca Gilbert

Adam Ginsburg

Ariella Glaser

Gerald Gold

Shlomit Goldberg-Stein

Marty Goldstein

Murray Goldstein

Tamar Goldwaser

Howie Goodman

Karen Goodman

David Graber

Donna Green

Philip Green

Lorie Greenberg

Naomi Greenblatt

Gayle Grossman-
Alweiss

Eli Grunstein

Daniel Hagler

Stephanie Haimowitz

Joel Hillelsohn

Jay Hochsztein

Sandra Hoenig

Robert Holley

Mark Horowitz

Steven Horwitz

Arthur Huber

Adam Jarrett

Steven Kanarek

Adam Karp

Brian Katz

Doron Katz

Micol Katz

Margit Kaufman

Shana Kaye

Aryeh Keehn

Alex Kimel

Yair Kissin

Irina Kissin

George Klafter

Daniel Klapper

Asher Kornbluth

John Kramer

Daniel Krich

Jeffrey Kuritzky

Jeremy Kurz

Seth Landa

Rebekah Langer

Yaron Langman

Simeon Lauer

Joyce Leavitt

Steve Lebovitch

Nate Lebowitz

Alden Leifer

Daniel Lerer

Harvey Lippman

Boaz Lissauer

Daniel Lowe

Alta Maness

Rachel Mann

Ranon Mann

Shari Mann

Zvi Marans

Eric Margolis

Daniel Markowicz

Howard Mazin

Edith Meier

Efrat Meier-Ginsberg

Ronnie Meier

Zachary Merriam

Akiva Mintz

Maria Montoya

Lara Mor

Leslie Moskowitz

Claire Murphy

Michael Novogroder

Jeff Paley

Jeff Pavell

Alan Perlman

Sheri Picone

Dorienne Planer

Benjamin Planer

Kenneth Prager

Jay Reidler

Robin Reingold

Jonathan Resnick

Caron Rockman

Sharon Rosen

Gene Rosenberg

Philip Roth

Murray Rothman

Joshua Rovner

aron s

Suraj Saggar

Ruth Scher

Hope Schlossberg

Richard Schlussel

Steven Schuss

Aron Schwarcz

Laurie Schwartz

Rachelle Schwarz

Jason Shatkin

Sharone Sheffer-Babila

Tracie Shore

Matisyahu Shulman

Tina Sichrovsky

Noam Siev

Joshua Silverberg

Lynn Silverberg

Michael Silverberg

Rob Simon

Shira Slasky

Tzvi Small

Alyson Small

Stephen Smiles

Aliza Solomon

Yasmine Spencer

Alan Spiegel

Luba Stein

Aaron Stein

Kylei Stewart

Larry Stiefel

Jeffrey Stone

Ronald Strobel

Dora Suldan

Zalman Suldan

Erica Tannenbaum

Steven Tennenbaum

Yossi Tennenhaus

Micole Tuchman

Seth Uretsky

Jared Wasserman

Lisa Weinstock

Christopher Weiss

Michelle Weissman

Mordechai Wertheim

Mark Wiesen

David Wild

Charlie Wimpfheimer

Judy Wimpfheimer

Yoni Koslowsky

Luis Zapiach

Rebecca Zausmer Senderowicz

Michael Zelenetz

Rachel Zuckerbrot