'It's A War Zone': Life As A Brooklyn Nurse On The Front Lines Of COVID-19
Ria Rahman, a 27-year-old registered nurse at the Maimonides Medical Center emergency department in Brooklyn, is used to the 12-hour shifts. From 3 p.m. to 3 a.m., the trauma nurse has worked with patients who’ve suffered heart attacks and strokes, gunshot victims and people injured in car crashes.
When the coronavirus outbreak hit New York City at the beginning of March, Rahman said she was seeing 20 to 30 coronavirus patients a day. That same month, Rahman came down with a fever, and on March 20, she found out that she had COVID-19, the illness caused by the virus. She has been self-quarantining at her Bay Ridge home and is set to go back to work next week.
Over 4,700 people have died of COVID-19 in New York state alone, with more than 130,000 confirmed cases of the disease. Nearly 17,000 people are currently hospitalized in the state. On Monday, Gov. Andrew Cuomo (D) said at a news briefing that those who had died were people the hospitals “could not save” and that their deaths were not due to a lack of beds, ventilators or medical staff.
The governor also announced an increase in the maximum fine for anyone breaking social distancing measures from $500 to $1,000.
“You don’t have the right to burden other people with your irresponsibility,” he said.
Rahman has described the scenes at her local hospital as chaotic. As a front-line health care provider and former coronavirus patient, she told HuffPost she’s frustrated by the “inadequacy of the government” and by individuals who are still not heeding to calls to stay home.
An Overwhelming Physical And Mental Toll
Although Rahman is feeling better, she considers herself among the lucky ones. The lack of proper equipment and protection has put front-line health care providers like her at risk, and it’s only getting worse, she said.
“Fortunately, I was able to survive this and I was able to be OK. Unfortunately, I know many nurses and colleagues that happened to not be doing as well,”...
