Curse Of Corona – Part III

Part – I can be read here

Part – II can be read here

In the beginning of the year 2021, my mother got hospitalized with multiple infections. Considering her age (late eighties/early nineties). doctors were not very hopeful that she would be able to make it. But with God’s blessings, she survived. But her health was frail and immune system was very weak. Soon after, she was afflicted with Corona. The diagonosis was moderately severe – an ideal case for clinical isolation, i.e., re-hospitalization. However, her attending physician knew that she being in advanced stage of dementia, total isolation would have more negative than positive impact on her. Dementia patients do not take kindly to any change of scene. They need those who they are used to seeing every day. So, though professionally speaking, hospitalization (complete seclusion) was required, however, as a necessary deviation (specific to her case), under physician’s advice she was retained at home but her room was practically converted into a hospital ward to provide all the needful treatment and ensure the requisite safety measures.

This was the most difficult period that I went through during Corona. It was a time when the immediately required medicines were not available/was in shortfall in the market. There was one particular shop alone in the whole area which had the anti-virals. I remember standing in queue in the heat of the Capital’s peak summer afternoon to procure the tablets. Later, I heard the experiences of my colleagues which were worse and more disturbing. As the number of patients peaked, these tablets became more and more hard to get. One of my senior colleagues, whose husband was afflicted with the disease, had to get it couriered from Chennai as all the local shops denied availability. However, she also received telephone calls from anonymous callers who confirmed that they could deliver the said medicines at a certain price!!

My mother’s physician was a COVID-warrior. Yes, that was the term given to all those who, despite the challenges of the deadly disease, did not hesitate to provide essential commodities and services to general public. Doctors, nurses, medical staff and attendants, security staff of hospitals, Diagonostic Centre workers who collected samples and swabs from COVID afflicted homes. The regiment also included those who delivered LPG Cylinders (Cooking Gas) to homes, Tank Truckers who supplied fuels (Petrol/Diesel/CNG) to the Pumps and Stations and Defense bases, the Paramedics, the Ambulance Service Providers and many more. These men and women put their lives at risk to provide urgent facilities to those who were at risk or could be at risk of contacting the disease.

These were the times when the concept of teleconsultation and consultation through video calling became in vogue. Both the physicians who attended my mother were available, even at the oddest hours, to provide consultation over telephone/video calling knowing that my mother’s was a critical case. God bless them both. Not only them, but one of the Doctor’s wife (who is a dentist) actually gave me the address of the shop where I could find the much needed medicines when all the shops refused to provide the same.

As a gesture of acknowledgment of their services, five star hotels, which were going without business at peak Corona period, opened their hospitality (charge free) to the nearest hospital staff who were quarantined there at intervals taking breaks from their onerous duty. I find every reason to chronicle the good and the bad of the formidable times that the world encountered as a reminder of the great deeds humans are capable of during worst periods of history and probably it is this virtue that pulls along mankind towards survival and progression in the face of near extinction.

We Indians have this weird sense of almost obtuse fatalism which at times proves to be something akin to, may I say, a positive driver. I often scolded my vegetable seller for not properly tying the mask which would be dangling from either ears or failed to cover his nose fully. In reply, he would flare up his nostrils and say, “Didi! Gareeb ko Corona nahin hota” (Corona does not happen to the poor). To which I would retort, “Can Corona differentiate between the rich and the poor?” He did not have any answer to that but was not convinced either.

During mother’s hospitalization, my nephew asked one of the hospital guards how he tackled with his personal safety and health issues. The guard also had a similar stance like that of my vegetable seller which was something like “Who says humans can infect each other with Corona. It is for God to decide…” which stupefied my nephew and he could only shake his head in utter astonishment.

But the incident that touched me the most was when I fell sick in the cab by which I was commuting to office one fine day post lifting of lockdown. Just before that I had had a mild altercation with the driver. I don’t remember the exact cause. However, midway I had to request him to pull over as I was feeling hopelessly sick. He quietly did so and waited till I was well enough to continue the journey. Neither did he object nor was he terrified. He just told me to unmask my face. I was horrified and told him it would not be okay for either of us. To which he replied, “Don’t worry ma’am. I have carried many a Corona patients, my relatives and neighbours, in this car to the hospital and nothing has ever happened to me. You pull down your mask and breathe deeply it will make you feel good.”

Paying heed to his “ancient wisdom” I thanked and blessed him silently.

….to be continued/-