In a single morning this week, four patients died in the coronavirus department where David Vodiansky has been hospitalized for more than a month. His wife says all she can do is pray.
Saturday will be his 52nd birthday, but Alin Zaraabel has resigned herself to the fact that she won’t be able to congratulate him, and neither will the coupleâs two teenage children. He is sedated and connected to a breathing machine.
Zaraabel’s teary interview with The Times of Israel took place Tuesday at the Galilee Medical Center in Nahariya. She admits that both she and her husband were big coronavirus cynics until the morning of August 31, when he was raced from their home in Maâalot-Tarshiha to the hospital. They donât know how he became infected.
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âI just didnât believe in coronavirus,â she said. âI thought it was all politics. I was sure it was nonsense, and even made faces when people mentioned it.â
The effects of COVID-19, known to stubbornly stay with some patients for long periods, have refused to subside in her husband. And while he isnât currently getting worse, he isnât showing consistent improvement either.
âThings change from day to day, sometimes they get better and sometimes worse,â Zaraabel said, noting that Vodiansky’s symptoms extend beyond breathing problems. âOn some days his kidneys are working well, on other days not so well.â
Vodianskyâs condition is classed as serious. When he came around after first being sedated, he didnât know where he was, and when told, had difficulty absorbing it.
âWhen they reduced his sedative and he came around, they said to him, ‘Do you know where you are? Youâre in the coronavirus ward,'” Zaraabel recounted. “He said: ‘Itâs not possible, there’s no coronavirus; it’s just politics.’ They replied: ‘So what are you doing here?'”
Vodiansky is a computer engineer with no known pre-existing health issues apart from high blood pressure.
“On August 30 we went and walked in Nahariya, we had a great day, and then at night he said he felt pressure in his chest,” Zaraabel said. âThen, at 8 a.m. the next morning, he had difficulty breathing and we called an ambulance. He has been in the hospital ever since.”
âItâs the coronavirus intensive care and I canât go there, and anyway he can’t talk. I just speak to the nurses, who kindly explain, over and over again, how he is doing. There is just me, him and the kids in our family and, of course, Iâm worried.
âIt kills me that I can’t help him. I can do nothing but pray,â she said.
perspectiveiskey on October 7th, 2020 at 10:47 UTC »
This pandemic has revealed that there are actually two viruses at play. One is the covid virus, but the other one which is imo much more virulent, is the virus of the mind that evidently makes half of the world population believe in completely bonkers conspiracy theories.
I'm completely serious about this, too. The meme that has now spread to the majority of the population that makes educated people think that somehow this is a global political conspiracy is a serious weakness of the human intellect/psyche.
couchrealistic on October 7th, 2020 at 10:28 UTC »
Which is among the top risk factors for severe covid.
Also, he seems to be quite ignorant, which is a huge risk factor for contracting the virus. I mean, we've seen Covid hospital / patient reports from countries all over the world, in all kinds of media, starting early this year. Yet he still believed, in August, that it's all just politics and the virus doesn't exist. Surely he is not dumb, since he's an engineer, so he's willingly ignorant. He has nobody to blame other than himself and maybe his wife who enabled him in and shared his ignorance.
jchang23 on October 7th, 2020 at 10:01 UTC »