“I truly thought I was going to die” says Dale Donaldson.
Dale Donaldson, a 56-year-old man from Brooklyn New York was diagnosed with the coronavirus March 29. Two weeks of uncertainty and fear filled the Donaldson household.
According to the CDC, there have been 605,390 total reported cases of COVID-19 in the United States, and 24,582 total deaths reported.
We are living in a historic time. People are helpless and scared.
“A lot of people in our neighborhood don’t understand the seriousness of this virus. I had a fever of 104 degrees for eight days, — eight days man” says Donaldson. “I had no desire to eat or drink, I felt like my body was eating at itself.”
Two weeks of fluids, isolation, and prayer is what got Dale through the scariest time of his life.
“Coronavirus’ have been around for a long time,” says Virologist and Associate Professor of Biology Dr. Sarah McDonald.
With symptoms of fever, cough, and extreme difficulty breathing; COVID-19 is hard to decipher at first because it will look like a normal cold.
“COVID-19 is 10 times more deadly than the seasonal flu,” says Dr. McDonald “We are not primed, and our bodies have not seen this before.”
This virus is more dangerous than the average flu, but the question is “why?’
Flu has been circulating for years. The new coronavirus that has emerged and is causing a pandemic this is different due to the fact that our immune systems are seeing this for the first time.
“To say I was scared is an understatement,” says Jeannette Donaldson, wife of Dale Donaldson “I would stay up at night just to make sure Dale was still breathing.”
According to the World Health Organization, the COVID-19 virus spreads primarily through droplets of saliva or discharge from the nose when an infected person coughs or sneezes. When we cough, sneeze and talk we are spraying microscopic of spit, which is filled with the virus.
“The way in which this virus was established is deadly, it is an inflammatory reaction from Acute Respiratory Distress” says Dr. McDonald. “People can’t breathe because their lungs have so much inflammation, they are dying from their immune response from it.”
Once enough people get it the question becomes are you immune to it and can you get it again? There are so many unknowns to this virus and that is what scares people.
“The human body is the perfect host for this virus because we have never seen it or know how to fight it off,” says Dr. McDonald. With 99 percent of people recovering, our immune systems do eventually win.
The problem arises with people do not know that they are ill. If you have no idea that you are ill, you don’t know that you are spreading germs.
“Not being able to leave the house just made everything worse, when Dad would cough if felt like the whole house would freeze,” said Jireh Donaldson, daughter of Dale. “Dad had his own personal set of dishes and his own personal area of the house, where no one would enter.”
The COVID-19 virus affects different people in different ways.
75 or 80 percent of the people won’t really become sick or require medical care, the problems lie with the people who have pre-existing health conditions who then develop COVID-19 says the CDC 75 to 80 percent of people that get infected are mildly symptomatic.
“I was lucky that my immune system was strong enough to fight off the virus, not everyone is that blessed,” says Dale.
Some may have a sniffle or sneeze; some will be in the hospital, but most won’t become severely ill.
“I couldn’t watch the news because I would get so scared that he would become another coronavirus statistic,” says Jeannette.
More than 30,000 people with the coronavirus have now died in the United States, according to a New York Times database. In the last week, there have been three days with more than 2,000 additional deaths announced.
“I probably prayed about three times a day for Dad to get better,” says Jireh \ “there was nothing we could for him, it was scary to watch his health decline at such a fast rate.”
According to the New York Times, “People with the virus have died in more than 30 New York counties, including more than 660 victims each in Nassau, Suffolk and Westchester Counties.”
With the death rates continuing to rise, the Donaldson household was terrified of what the upcoming weeks would bring.
“The coronavirus affects you differently when it is inside your own house,” says Jireh.
“Knowing your husband might not make it through the night is one of the scariest things imaginable,” says Jeannette.
Reporting Index:
- Dale Donaldson
- Jeannette Donaldson
- Jireh Donaldson
- Sarah McDonald
- https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/world/coronavirus-maps.html
- https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/index.html
- https://www.who.int/health-topics/coronavirus#tab=tab_1