This Labor Day, let’s honor the workers who have been on the front lines of the pandemic

“Every single day doing the same thing over and over again, and you just never think there’s going to be an end.” So commented a critical care nurse at a Florida hospital facing a surge in hospitalizations of covid-19 patients. “They are all super sick, intubated, sedated and on their bellies, it’s disheartening,” said another intensive-care nurse. “Tired, overworked and overwhelmed” was how a director of emergency medical services in Florida described hospital staff, reporting “we’re working really hard: working overtime, working late hours and taking on more than normal because we don’t have a choice.”

For 18 long, hard months, these workers have been on the front lines in the country’s fight against the coronavirus. They have been joined by people who deliver groceries, cook meals, pick up trash, patrol streets, clean hospitals and care for the frail. Despite the hardships and health risks, they do their jobs, day in and day out, too often for little pay and few benefits. As Labor Day is celebrated Monday — with the pandemic sadly far from vanquished — these essential workers should be remembered and honored above all.

It should not be lost on anyone that many of these workers won’t have the luxury enjoyed by much of the country to relax and enjoy Monday as a holiday. Instead of barbecuing with family or squeezing in a last trip to the beach, these people will be on the job, in stores and police stations and hospitals. “We don’t have a choice,” Kristy Dutton, director of emergency services at Lee Memorial and Gulf Coast Medical Center, noted in a candid post to Facebook. In return for their service, these workers increasingly are having to contend with abuse from the very people they are trying to help because of ridiculous disagreements over masking and screening protocols. Health-care professionals report being cursed, screamed at and threatened with bodily harm. Flight attendants have had to resort to taking self-defense classes to deal with misbehavior from passengers. We have all seen the videos of retail and grocery store workers having to contend with angry and irrational customers who simply refuse to follow common-sense rules about masking. It’s all unacceptable.