Pedro Xavier Simões he was hospitalized in Coimbra when, on the last Monday, the man with whom he was sharing his room – like him, a recovering Covid-19 patient – will have decided that he could no longer stand being there and that, for the sake of his “sanity”, he had to go home. He left the hospital, took a taxi to the train station and it was there that, shortly afterwards, he would end up being captured by the police, constituted the accused and returned to the hospital.
This was one of the most unusual moments of the troubled experience lived in recent weeks by the young man of 30 years, manager of marketing and e-commerce in a company that produces (and exports) bicycle parts in Águeda, Aveiro district. Pedro Simões started having the first symptoms on Tuesday, the 10th, when he returned to the company after having gone to his parents’ lunch. He went to the Águeda hospital, no one was able to speak to the SNS24 – contact with the hospital took more than a day – and he was eventually taken to Coimbra. Now, he has returned home, he is recovering well – he still has some cough, but “residual”. “In the middle of misfortune, I was even lucky to be one of the first infected“, Says in an interview with the Observer.
This is the story, told by himself, in a direct (edited) speech:
The first symptoms I felt on March 10. I came here for lunch at my parents’ house, which is close to my company – I had lunch with my mother. But when I got back to work, I started to feel dizzy, headaches, cold, chills. I was doing my normal work, surrounded by my colleagues, as always. At one point, I went upstairs to the finance department, looked at me and saw that I was not well. “I’m really not feeling well,” I replied.
Then, I went to speak with the person responsible for hygiene and safety at work, went to her, measured the tension and the fever – it was 37.8 ºC. We tried for an hour to call SNS24 but no one answered. We tried to call from several phones, but nothing.
So I decided to go to the hospital and, as soon as I got in, I said right away at the reception that I had a high fever and other symptoms. And I stressed that I had been with Italians.
By this time, it was already known that Italy had the main European focus of the disease caused by the new coronavirus. Pedro Simões knew that, saying this, he would have a “green way” to be treated as soon as possible. Although, today, I have many doubts that it was infected by these Italians.
When I said I had been with Italians, I didn’t even go to the screening. They put me right in the isolation room, which is an improvised room in the bar area. In that room, there is a table for the person to lie down. And a window.
I was on the phone with the nurses, and in the meantime, a doctor was there, wearing a mask and protection. I explained the symptoms I had and he measured my fever – it had already risen to 38.5 ºC. My body hurt and I was cold. They gave me brufen to drink.
The doctor left the isolation room and went to register. After a while, he called me on the phone to say that I had to wait for the directions that would be given. At the same time, he asked me more questions: where have I been, with whom have I been … I was talking to him, lying there on the couch, while they told me they were waiting for the SNS24 to make a decision, because there were no tests available to be at the Águeda Hospital.
From 4:00 pm to 6:00 pm I was there for two hours, waiting … I was getting impatient because the fever wasn’t going down and I was cold. They only called me at 6 pm to say that they had managed to speak with a doctor from Coimbra who, with my data, validated that it was necessary to go for the exam. But first, the Hospital of Águeda had to be able to speak to SNS24 in order to register the occurrence and send a special transport.
And that’s when “the whole complication started”, says Pedro Simões.
They did not answer calls, not even the private line at Hospital de Águeda. They did not respond to tickets, the hospital sent e-mails, no one answered … They were medicating me with more brufen. When it was 10 pm, they brought me something to eat, a blanket, a thermometer to measure the fever. All of this was left on a window sill – they left things, walked away and I went there to get it. And they talked to me on the phone while waiting for answers, even though the case was already more than validated by the doctor from Coimbra.
I ended up sleeping there and, in the morning, they brought me breakfast. But they told me that they had not yet been able to speak to the SNS24. It was only shortly after 10:00 am on that Wednesday that they called to say that they had managed to speak to them. So, I had to wait for a special INEM van, which would take about an hour to arrive, to pick me up.
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