The COVID-19 situation in the US, where more than 143,000 infection cases have reported as of now, healthcare employees have revealed details about their jobs at the hospitals where they are facing several difficulties due to lack of equipment and poor safety measures.
Recently, a New York hospital emergency room nurse shared a photo of a makeshift morgue and revealed the seriousness of the Coronavirus pandemic. The male nurse revealed that he took some pictures of the morgue while leaving a shift on Sunday morning, March 29.
Coronavirus affected New York
The pictures showed a refrigerated truck, parked outside the hospital's ambulance bay. As per the unnamed nurse, the vehicle was filled with deceased Coronavirus patients. While talking to the Buzzfeed, the male nurse said that it is "the ghastly reality of what we deal with and where some of us have ended up already."
He said the body of one of his patients, 71-year-old woman, who recently died after being infected by the Coronavirus, was also inside the truck. The nurse mentioned, "I never had the patience to sit with somebody I'd just met until they took their last breath. But I really liked this lady's cardigan and pajamas so I decided to stay and get to know her a little."
The elderly woman was tested positive for COVID-19 a week ago and was sent home. But she returned to the hospital on Saturday, March 28 complaining severe breathing problem.
The social media picture
The male nurse who is a Jewish linked the picture with the gruesome images of Holocaust victims. He said that he never witnessed something like this and added, "Maybe as a Jew I relate it to all of the Holocaust footage because that's my only point of reference for such an image of humans."
The truth about US healthcare facilities
Healthcare staff, who are risking their lives and going to work every day to treat patients, narrated the reality behind the safety measures they are asked to follow in respective hospitals in the US. A few days ago, a nurse from New Jersey, Sonja Schwartzbach who created an online document and invited many people to share their experience at work, has revealed that hospital conditions were "far worse" than most people realized.
A Pennsylvania nurse said that the employees at her hospital had received an email where the authorities asked them not to remove gloves when in a room if they get soiled, but to use sanitizers over the gloves. The email also added, "You also have to keep the same surgical mask on the entire shift. You only get an N95 if certain procedures are being done that would produce aerosols. This is absolutely unacceptable and puts all the staff, other patients and my family at high risk."
Healthcare employees at Mount Sinai West hospital in Manhattan were asked to wear trash bags while treating COVID-19 patients. After this, Kious Kelly, 48, an employee of the hospital died after he was admitted in the same facility as he tested positive for Coronavirus.
