I rubbed my eyes. My head throbbed. Behind my dry eyes was a rhythmic, pulsing ache. I shook my head in some half-hearted and defeated attempt to ditch the pain, like a dog clearing its ears of water after coming out of the river. I caught a glimpse of the clock; 3:30 AM. The light was on in my room and I could make out the tinny voice broadcasted from the radio. We were being summoned to a local care facility for an elderly female with a cough and fever. Again.
And we were scared.
Our station covers a small collection of care facilities, ranging in size and capabilities. Many of them have skirted the grip of the Coronavirus, but a few have fallen prey to its constricting, enveloping presence. One of these local facilities has been hit especially hard. It is an assisted living care facility that houses roughly 100 residents.
Assisted living facilities typically provide food, entertainment, and various assistance with some activities of daily living. Residents are free to come and go as they please, and they rent rooms much like an apartment complex.
This facility saw its first case of coronavirus roughly 1 month ago. My crew went on the first case. It was an elderly gentleman complaining of fever, fatigue, and some shortness of breath. Aware of the potential threat, we donned our highest level PPE. Dressed like space men, we lumbered into the facility. We made contact and found the gentleman. He was a little weak on his feet, and perhaps breathing a little fast, but otherwise didn’t seem any worse for the wear.
We loaded him onto the stretcher and maneuvered back to the ambulance. While we were walking, he shook his head, half-hearted and defeated, eyes fixed in front of him. A soft, rolling sigh came out, cushioning the phrase that followed.
“I begged them not to go to the casino.”
He died a few days later. So did his wife.
At the time of writing this, 10 of the facility’s residents have died from the coronavirus, with more infections confirmed every day. The facility’s manager is a woman with jet black hair, gray Sketcher’s shoes that are mostly hidden under dark green scrubs, and a surgical mask, and she wanted to speak with us. Her fingers were interlaced, hands resting on top of her head. As she spoke, she shook her head slowly and half-heartedly, defeat resting palpably on her brow. She explained to us that despite daily cleanings from a professional company, the coronavirus has continued to migrate from host to host at the facility. She explained that residents are scared. Many of them feel abandoned by family. They think a positive coronavirus test is a death sentence, and that the virus seems to decide who it wants to infect next.
After the call, we spent close to 45 minutes meticulously sanitizing the interior of the ambulance. As I stepped out of the back of the ambulance, I peeked over my shoulder to glimpse a panorama of my cleaning work: a scorched-earth attack on every square inch of the patient compartment. Every portion of the ambulance was seemingly moist with commercial-grade disinfectant.
I’ve spent hours recounting what that patient said. I think about the fear he must have had to beg his fellow residents to stay quarantined. I imagine the sobering reality of first feeling those symptoms, and I can’t help but correlate his diagnosis to those who left for the casino against his plea. I’ve seen on social media stories of people who have gotten sick despite being quarantined at home for over a month. I sometimes find myself wondering: can this virus really decide who it wants to infect?
This virus seems to toy with those it infects. Many of these patients feel mildly ill, don’t feel quite right, or have other non-concerning symptoms. There is perhaps a sense of hope; maybe I’ll get through this with mild symptoms. The virus lulls its victims into a misleading hope. It waits for the right moment, once it has given itself enough time to infect a few more people, then it strikes. It strikes hard and fast.
There have been bad flu seasons before. I have transported patients with the flu that have later succumbed to the virus. I have never seen a care facility as ravaged from a virus as this one. Never in my career have I seen multiple different couples die of the same virus within days of each other, all from the same facility. Seeing this disease show off its craft is intimidating, especially knowing the only thing between us and it is our PPE.
We are lucky where I work to have the robust supply of PPE we do. Hazmat suits, full SCBA masks with clip-on filters or clean air tanks, and eye protection of your choosing. Which is why it was all the more unsettling when a coworker got coronavirus.
Around the same time this virus became entrenched at the care facility, it also became entrenched in one of our coworkers. Reputations and past performance carry a lot of weight in how events are perceived. If, for example, the workplace jerk is kicked out of a restaurant, we may find ourselves siding with the business, assuming that the jerk had it coming. On the other hand, if a restaurant kicks out the humble, well-mannered coworker, our perception becomes much different.
The coworker who got sick has a sterling reputation, at least with me, as a paramedic. His nature of cleanliness, disinfecting, and appropriate PPE usage stems back beyond our current pandemic. Prior to working with me now at our current employer, he used to work on an ambulance that exclusively transported the sickest of sick children. Proper PPE, cleanliness, and appropriate disinfecting procedures were not just important, they were paramount.
He tested positive around the end of March. For 3–5 days, he fought severe fatigue. His sense of taste and smell both left, and a dry cough took their place. Gradually, he began to feel better. It’s our department’s policy for anyone infected with coronavirus to have 2 consecutive negative coronavirus tests to be cleared for work.
His first test was positive. The following test was negative. Following the negative test, he has had 2 subsequent positive tests. At the time of writing this article, he has still not been cleared for work.
He’s not the only one, either. In Oklahoma, an EMT named Ibeth Carpenter has been hospitalized for over a month due to complications from coronavirus. News On 6 reported that Carpenter has been denied any worker’s compensation insurance for her illness. She is believed to have been infected while caring for a patient back in February.
This is my job. I do it so I can provide for my family. I have found myself thinking of my coworker and of other cases of sick first responders lately. I often wonder, if I get too sick to work, what happens to my family? Will my family be a forgotten casualty?
A constant demeanor from those affected by coronavirus has been the same: defeat. Beyond all else, the bell of defeat rings loudly and religiously in the presence of coronavirus. I’ve found that all I can do, all anyone can do in the moment, is hang my head, half-hearted and defeated.
I slung my radio over my shoulder, clicked the garage door button, and slid my feet into my boots as the hum of the garage door motor echoed in the bay. I sat in the driver’s seat and thought about all the patients who had died at this facility. I thought about my coworker, a beacon for good procedure, sick for over a month. I thought about my wife and my 6-month old twins at home. The humming stopped. The door was open. The ambulance roared to life, followed by the melodic rumble of the diesel engine. We pulled the ambulance onto the apron and I turned on the emergency lights. Red and blue flashes cut through a blanket of darkness, and we started once more towards the virus.
And we were scared.