Covered by various masks, a visor, and a protective suit, the doctor Joseph Varon He leans over to one of his covid-19 patients and waves his hand in front of the phone she is holding.
On the other side of the video call, relatives of this woman, Gloria García, express their joy at seeing the doctor who helped save her from the coronavirus.
Varon, chief of staff at the small United Memorial hospital, located in an underprivileged north Houston, Texas neighborhood, made headlines last week when a photo of him hugging an elderly patient with the disease went viral on Thanksgiving Day. .
In the image, a thin, white-haired man has his head sunk against the doctor’s arm, barely recognizable under his equipment but hunched over in a gesture of comfort.
A moment of clear empathy that turned into crisis symbol across the country, which has faced a spectacular rebound in the epidemic for several weeks.
While greeting Mrs. García’s family, the doctor tries to reassure her. But just because he has such compassionate gestures doesn’t mean he’s not exhausted.
Is his 263 working day consecutive. “I keep my account these days better than my bank account,” he says.
He has gained 15 kilos. “Like what they bring me, because you don’t know when you’ll be able to eat again,” he explains, pointing to a box of donuts.
Even the few hours you spend at home each day are interrupted by endless phone calls. Just sleep, he says, of one to two hours per night. “Don’t ask me how I do this.”
It’s not the only one. In July, he himself alerted the media about the difficulties facing his teams.
The staff “He’s very tired. The nurses burst into tears in the middle of the day. They are going to go broke because they are overwhelmed by the number of cases, “he said.” They are exhausted.
The reinforcements did not stay
Inside the intensive care unit, all beds are occupied.
Sitting on the edge of hers, Gloria García fixes her hairstyle and makeup before going on a video call. But many of the patients are lying on cushions. Posted on the walls are posters and cards wishing the sick a “good recovery“.
The faces of the medical staff are barely visible behind their glasses and masks. Some, including Dr. Varon, have their photo hanging from the neck.
During the summer military reinforcements arrived along with a medical team, but they did not stay.
The hospital still benefits from the help of nurses who come from other parts of the country since the beginning of the pandemic, to help with whatever is necessary.
Demetra Ranson left Florida to travel first to New York, the epicenter of the outbreak in the spring, and then to other hot spots before arriving in Houston.
For comfort patients, often touches their arms or shoulders and even talks to those who cannot respond, he explains. She tells them where they are, just in case they can hear her.
“Covid hunters”
Things shouldn’t have come to this, believes Dr. Varon, who has often expressed “frustration” at Texans’ lack of respect for sanitary rules.
“People do everything that is wrong: they go to bars or restaurants,” he lamented during an interview. “People don’t listen and it ends up in me resuscitation unit. They have to know that I don’t want to have to hug them. ”
In November, this state became the first in the country to exceed one million cases of coronavirus.
The Republican Governor of Texas, Greg Abbott, ordered a close of a month in April, but after that deadline he did not extend it. The use of a mask was only mandatory in July.
For Joseph Varon, the next six to twelve weeks, along with the Christmas and New Years holidays, will be “the darkest weeks of the modern history of medicine in the United States, “he predicted.
In this situation, the staff prepares as much as they can. During the rare moments of calm, in a room adorned with a banner that reads “Covid hunters“They try to catch their breath.
ROA
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