When COVID-19 attacked Americans, nurses and other health care professionals became our first line of defense.
They have been compared to the firefighters and police who responded to terrorist attacks on 9/11.
In some places, like New York City, they were plunged into a desperate struggle to save lives.
With calm courage and quiet determination, nurses are helping others.
Here are some of their stories.
Clinical nurse at the Mount Sinai Hospital in New York City.
She has been a nurse for 37 years.
“I have been a nurse since the beginning of AIDS crisis in the early 1980s.
That was nothing compared to this.
The rise of the coronavirus has been so rapid, so vicious.
There is a lot of stress.
But I didn’t get into nursing for the glamour.
My husband is a nurse, too.
Our son works in a hospital as an administrative assistant.
We do the social distance thing … even in a Manhattan apartment.
I partly cope with humor; it has got me through life.
I just hope it lasts.
Everybody is on the ledge.
My duties used to be logical and organized nothing unusual, certainly nothing catastrophic.
Now it’s hectic.
I describe it as organized chaos.
I don’t know what I am going to walk into.
I just want to see to it my patients are breathing.
This is the new normal.
We find out how many nurses are virus-positive, or who are quarantined because they are symptomatic.
Every day, those numbers rise.
I have not been tested for the virus.
We don’t have enough tests in New York for all health-care personnel.
I don’t care about the consequences.
I will not stop doing what I love to do.
We are a special breed.
During disasters and the coronavirus is the ultimate disaster we don’t walk away.
But I am scared every day.”
Prior to that, she was an EMT with the hospital for 18 years.
“It has been a steep learning curve for us.
We didn’t know exactly how the virus was spread.
If patients with symptoms are stable, they’re likely to be sent home and advised to quarantine.
These rooms make the air safer for us to breathe.
I’m somewhat concerned for myself, my husband and our two daughters.
We’re pretty healthy.
Currently, it feels more like I can step in and be of use.
With the extremes of where this job can take you, it challenges me to engage my faith daily.
I had a teenager a week and a half ago who appeared very anxious.
It was remarkable for a someone this age to show that sort of appreciation.
Three nurses and several administrators work in the hospital’s garage.
The specimen is then sent to the hospital’s lab.
