HOUSTON (Reuters) – Shortly after midnight, Duc Nguyen sat up in his hospital bed for a video call with his wife. The glow of a television and a streetlamp outside his window provided the only light as a nasal cannula carried oxygen to his lungs.
It wasn’t like the 33-year-old had envisioned welcoming the New Year, but he said he was grateful that the United Memorial Medical Center (UMMC) in Houston had a spare bed so he could be treated for pneumonia caused by COVID-19.
Nguyen said he was confident he would recover, but he predicted the worst days of the pandemic would come.
“We’ll have another treat next year,” he said in a raspy voice. “It’s not over yet.”
Similar scenes took place across the country as a post-Thanksgiving spate of infections, adding to the number of patients forced into a hospital room in 2021 alone by a virus that has claimed more than 342,000 American lives.
Located in a working-class neighborhood in north Houston, UMMC has been hit hard by the waves of business that invaded Texas in the summer and fall, taking a tremendous physical and emotional toll on nurses like Tanna Ingraham, who herself has overcome two attacks from COVID-19.
Normally, Ingraham may have called in the New Year to share drinks with friends. Instead, this week she still had to cope with the sudden death of a patient who had just been taken off a ventilator, amid signs that she was recovering.
Like her, the patient was 43, and Ingraham held back tears as she pulled the hoses from her body and put them in a body bag – a task she has become accustomed to this year. For Ingraham, 2021 and a widespread vaccination cannot come soon enough.
‘I just hope there will be a light at the end of this, because honestly, that’s the only thing that keeps me going. That and my faith, ”she said. “So in 2021 I will be ready.”
This week, Reuters followed doctors and nurses as they made their rounds on UMMC’s COVID-19 unit, pausing to check vital signs and sometimes grabbing a hug or a hand. Touch, Ingraham said she’d learned from her own battle with the disease, is critical to warding off a sense of despair.
EXCITING ATMOSPHERE
A handmade sign indicates the number of days – 287 – that staff have worked since the pandemic came to Texas in the spring. Mexican and American flags hang on the walls, a nod to the many medical students from Mexico who come to help and learn. A Christmas tree and Christmas decorations offset an otherwise tense mood amid worries about a wave to come.
On Thursday, Texas set a new record for COVID-19 hospital admissions, with 12,268 patients in hospitals across the state, further exceeding an earlier peak in July, according to data from the Texas Department of Health. A team from the University of Washington whose model has been used by the White House projects, state hospital admissions will peak on Jan. 9.
Dr. David Persse, the Houston Health Department’s health authority, is concerned that infections will accelerate in January and February as cases resulting from Christmas and New Year celebrations emerge. Another concern is the potential spread of a highly contagious variant of coronavirus discovered in Britain, he said.
“It’s a big concern,” Persse said. “We are all bracing ourselves to see if that happens.”
Dr. Joseph Varon, the hospital’s chief medical officer, spoke quickly Thursday afternoon while donning personal protective equipment. It was his 287th consecutive workday, and two more COVID-19 patients had died the previous night.
‘We have patients up to the wazoo. The departments are full. My nurses are exhausted. Emotions are everywhere. People are dying, ”said Varon, who received national attention in November after a photo of him hugging a COVID-19 patient went viral.
“I hope by 2021 that people will be a little more conscientious,” he said, referring to wearing a mask and social distancing. “That they understand that wearing your mask is protecting someone else.”
Terry Peden, a 57-year-old electrical engineer, came to Varon’s COVID-19 unit after being told by another hospital to stay home to overcome his illness, which evolved from a COVID-19 diagnosis to double pneumonia.
Peden said he was just happy to be alive and content to ring in the New Year with a call to his son and daughter from his hospital bed.
“I would love to be home, but so would the rest,” said Peden. “I will be happy when 2020 is over. It’s been a whole year for the whole world. “
Reporting by Callaghan O’Hare in Houston; Additional reporting by Nathan Layne in Wilton, Connecticut; Edited by Daniel Wallis and David Goodman