Covid diary, end of the first week

We are in an eerie place at the moment.

Australians have been watching the crisis unfold in front of our eyes – first in China, then in Europe and now in the US. It feels close to us because of the frightening numbers escalating every day in the news, at first 100 felt like a benchmark, then 1000, but now we are almost numbed by the numbers and their inevitable increase.

Let me tell you something from the frontline. There is nothing like something is real, until you see it with your own eyes.

It is only real when you stand, for the very first time, face-to-face with a patient infected with Covid-19. When you see them coughing, when you see them wiping their mouths, when you realise that their respiratory droplets are not just near you, but on you.

When you realise that you are shielded from the virus behind just a piece of plastic, or a corner of a gown, that is when it is real.

When you need to tell them that you have to put them on a ventilator to help them breathe, when they ring their families crying and saying goodbye to them for potentially the last time, that is when it is real.

When you walk out of the room wondering if you had put your gear on right, when you think maybe I am going to be one of the infected healthcare workers in the news, that is when it is real.

For the vast majority of the public, the coronavirus is still something that is happening to somebody else. The people going to the beaches and having house parties make me so angry. When I went into that room to be with a Covid-infected patient for the first time, for the second time, and then for the number of times that I cannot even count, I am not just “doing my job” as people would expect me to. I have a sense of professional responsibility to these people, this is what I am trained to do. But I am appalled by the behaviour of those people who put themselves at risk, who knowingly increase the burden on the health system with a nonchalant attitude of “it won’t affect me anyway because I am young”. Do these people not have parents, grandparents, friends and neighbours who will be affected by the virus? Do these people not wish for their loved ones to receive health care when it is needed? How little disregard do they have for the wellbeing of healthcare workers who are risking themselves to help the community?

There has been just a slow trickle of patients this week, one here and one there. The rate of admission into the ICU is slow enough that we have time to pause and reflect on our practices, trying to finetune everything so we know what to do when the rush of patients arrives. We have been preparing for weeks and the preparation itself is mentally exhausting. It feels deceptively slow right now, the ICU cleared of patients in anticipation for the tsunami that hasn’t hit. I found myself even wondering at times if we over-reacted, but just a quick glance at the news shows that the tsunami is real in other places. We are just on the flat part of the curve, and we desperately hope our social isolation measures have been enough.

It has now been a week since I left my family in Sydney and quarantined myself. I feel a huge sense of social responsibility towards them, and I have decided not to go back to Sydney until I know for sure that I will not be giving them the virus. That means I have to wait for one of three scenarios to arise 

 

(1) The covid-19 crisis is over and numbers of infections have ground to zero

(2) I contract covid-19 and recover to gain immunity

(3) I or one of my family members becomes critically ill with covid-19 and we have to say goodbye.

The methodical analytical part of my brain has spat out these scenarios, but none of them feel real right now. The coming weeks will be a huge physical challenge if we must work massive hours, and an even greater emotional challenge being in social isolation and dealing with the stresses of work. I have never thought so hard about my self-care ever. 

I have also never been imbued with such a strong sense of survival – every fiber of my being is screaming I want to survive! I want to stay physically well and mentally well. I want to come out of the other side of this and chalk it up to another disaster I have experienced and learned from. I look so much forward to that day when we are talking about all this in the historical sense.

But right now, we must live one day at a time.