Associated Press
The new coronavirus doesn’t care about a blue uniform or a shiny badge. Police, firefighters, paramedics and corrections officers are just a 911 call away from contracting COVID-19 and spreading it.
With N95 masks hanging off their duty belts and disposable blue gloves stuffed in their back pockets, they respond to radio calls, make arrests and manage prisoners. But their training never covered something quite like this — what has been called an “invisible bullet.”
It’s sickened thousands of America’s first responders and killed dozens more.
But many have recovered, and they’re going back to work — back to the crime scene, back into the ambulance, back to the jail. Going back to this deadly pandemic’s front lines.
They go with a lingering cough and lost weight. They toss and turn at night, wondering if the claims of immunity are true. They fear that picking up extra overtime shifts may expose them, and their families, to additional risks.
And then they pull on their uniforms and go back to work.
In Deputy Ravin Washington’s squad car, risk rides shotgun. The threats she faces on her solo patrols are usually more immediate than reports of some new unseen virus.
On the beat in northwest Houston, Washington, 28, has been in fights and drawn her gun. In 2017, three months after she finished the police academy, her partner at the time was shot in the leg.
But last month, she was following up on a robbery call when it suddenly felt like someone was sitting on her chest. By the time she navigated her cruiser to her sister’s apartment, she could barely keep her hands on the wheel. She had no idea what was wrong.
Certainty came a few days later after a nasal swab that felt like it poked her brain. On March 25, Washington tested positive — one of the first of about 180 Harris County Sheriff’s Office employees to be sickened.
In lonely isolation, her temperature spiked. Her stomach roiled. She lost her sense of taste and could barely rise from bed for days.
“People don’t want to be around you,” she said. “People don’t want to touch you.”
When she finally healed, she worried about getting sick again — about whether her colleagues would want her back.
She returned to patrol this month and found the situation suddenly reversed. Her colleagues gave her hugs. “People feel like, ‘Hey, you have the antibodies. You’re the cure,’” she said.
Back on patrol, Washington has the familiar weight on her hips of a Taser, handcuffs and gun. But her safety also depends on gloves and a mask.
“It’s like you’re risking your life even more now.”
Paramedic Alex Tull of the New York Fire Department feels out of breath after walking up a few flights of stairs and has a cough that just won’t quit. After some recent chest pains, an X-ray showed lingering inflammation in his lungs.
As he goes about his days treating coronavirus patients in the Bronx, he thinks about his own battle with the disease and his rush to return to duty late last month before he was fully healed.
At the height, about a quarter of the city’s 4,300 EMS workers were out sick. Nearly 700 fire department employees have tested positive for the coronavirus and eight have died, including three EMS workers.
Tull, 38, says he felt guilty convalescing at home for two weeks, flipping through Netflix and Hulu between naps as his colleagues risked their lives. He wondered: “Why did this have to happen to me? I want to be out there. I want to get out there and help.”
But it wasn’t just a matter of loyalty for the 10-year fire department veteran. A policy put in place as the virus ravaged the ranks mandated that personnel who no longer showed symptoms return to work as soon as possible.
“I definitely went back to work earlier than maybe I should have,” Tull said.
Without definitive proof that he’s immune from spreading or contracting the disease, Tull fears his nagging cough might infect his partner or their patients. And with little more than a face mask and gloves for protection, he worries he’ll come down with the virus again.
“Is my body ready for round two? I don’t know. It is scary,” Tull said.
Sgt. Cary Oliva was frustrated watching the news of his coronavirus-stricken city from his sick bed. The 31-year-old New York Police Department officer longed to be back at work helping with what was fast becoming one of the deadliest disasters in its history.
“I felt like I was on the sidelines,” he said. “I was pretty eager to come back as soon as possible, as long as it was safe.”
In all, more than 4,600 employees at the nation’s largest police department have tested positive for the coronavirus. Nearly 2,900 have recovered and returned to full duty. At least three dozen died.
Oliva went back April 6 and immersed himself in a new police mission: educating the public about social distancing measures that experts say are vital to reducing the spread of infection. Protective mask on his face and hand sanitizer nearby, Oliva spends his afternoons cruising by takeout restaurants and other businesses looking for gaps in social distancing protocols.
“I dove right back into it,” he said.
One comment
Sonja Fitch
May 4, 2020 at 4:20 pm
“We” will always owe you! Thank you!
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