The Truth About COVID-19
At this point, we’ve all seen the posts questioning the seriousness of COVID-19. “It’s just a bad flu.” “Wearing a mask won’t do anything.” “Only vulnerable populations really need to worry about it.”
A woman named Jodi Click took to the site Scary Mommy to share her experience with COVID-19. Her message is this: COVID-19 is more than just a bad flu, and you need to start caring about it. (1)
Jodi wrote her story on day 65 of being sick with COVID-19 and staying in isolation because of it. She reported that her temperature was over 103, she was constantly coughing, and she still needed to be on oxygen all the time. She described her blood pressure as being “a mess” because COVID-19 isn’t just attacking her lungs; Jodi has vascular damage and inflamed arteries. (1)
But the symptoms don’t stop there. Jodi wrote that she was too exhausted to walk across a room or even to pick up her phone because it sometimes feels too heavy. She described abdominal cramping and diarrhea, extreme eye pain, and horrible headaches. Jodi said that she’s sometimes too afraid to sleep because she’s afraid that her oxygen will drop too low and she won’t wake up. (1)
The list goes on with nausea and vomiting, the loss of smell and taste, bone and muscle pain, and loss of appetite. Jodi wrote that she sometimes coughs so hard that she feels like she needs to vomit. And she has broken ribs from coughing constantly. (1)
COVID-19 is no joke.
Fellow Humans
Besides being one of the people who has contracted COVID-19 and is surviving it, Jodi has an additional perspective: she has Crohn’s disease. So when she hears statements like, “It’s only the elderly or those with underlying conditions who get really sick and die,” it’s personal. (1)
“I’m the high-risk group everyone is willing to lock away in their houses forever and let fend for themselves, or die, for convenience,” she wrote. (1)
Saying that only certain groups of people need to worry about coronavirus is just not true. Plenty of people who are young and don’t have underlying conditions have contracted it, Jodi argues. And many have died from it. Those who don’t die, Jodi says, will have long-term health issues even after surviving COVID-19. (1)
But even if only vulnerable groups were at risk of contracting COVID-19, shouldn’t that concern the rest of us? As Jodi wrote, “Elderly and people with underlying conditions are fellow humans — your friends, your family, your colleagues, your bosses, your kids’ teachers, your neighbors, your fellow church member.” You shouldn’t have to be personally concerned about getting sick to want to protect the people around you. (1)
Wear a Mask
After describing her own COVID-19 symptoms, Jodi wrote, “When you refuse to wear a mask, you are saying you are okay with doing this to everyone you encounter or anyone who is in the same area after you and you are okay with them not being lucky to just suffer through hell but to also die a horrible death in isolation.” (1)
Like Jodi, I don’t think that wearing a mask and practicing social distancing is too great of a sacrifice for me to make to prevent the spread of COVID-19. Besides the many of my fellow humans who may get sick and die from this disease, I also worry about my sister and brother-in-law. Both are healthcare providers working in hospitals with COVID-19 patients. The longer the pandemic persists, the longer they’re at risk.
I don’t want anyone to have to experience what Jodi has. And the more than 100,000 American lives that have been lost to this disease are already far too many. If I can help prevent it from spreading by wearing a mask, I’m happy to do so. I hope you’ll join me. (1)
