Covid warriors: The real superheroes sans capes

Not all heroes wear capes, some wear scrubs, PPE kits, surgical gloves, stethoscopes and still don’t live to see another week! Despite all precautions, the sanitisers, the triple masks, and the PPE kits many medical professionals have themselves succumbed to the infection while treating their patients

Relentlessly attending to a steady stream of patients, running from bed to bed, going without food and water for over six hours at a stretch while sweating profusely under a heavy PPE kit such is the punishing daily routine of our medics in these drastic Covid times.

The deadly virus has not only gripped the body and mind of each patient in the ICU ward, but it also takes its toll on the emotional health of each medical personnel. (Representative Image/HT File)

Sadly, only a few privileged hospitals that can afford to give their staff PPE kits, which has exacted a toll on our heroic medical professionals, many of whom have succumbed to the deadly disease. I am the proud mother of a Covid warrior, a budding doctor, whom I have not hugged in weeks. Every day she is in close proximity with death, trying to save the lives of Covid patients. We only speak on the phone when she returns home after strenuous hours. She has isolated herself from the entire family so that we do not contract the deadly virus.

No, not all heroes wear capes, some wear scrubs, PPE kits, surgical gloves, stethoscopes and still don’t live to see another week! Despite all precautions, the sanitisers, the triple masks, and the PPE kits many medical professionals have themselves succumbed to the infection while treating their patients. Ironically, sometimes the patients survive but their medics do not. But, they just don’t give up, you know! The deep sense of morality, responsibility and duty takes over. There is nothing like ‘social distancing’ between a doctor and a patient in a Covid ward. They simply keep trying their best to save the hapless patient lying there gasping for breath, whose vitals are fluctuating, who is unable to reach out to his family, who fears death and who is dying to be given a second chance to live life just once more. The angels in white coats — nurse or doctor —are their only hope.

Coming from a family of army veterans where her grandfather and father have fought for India, my daughter was not one to sit at home, though many told her to make up some excuse to skip the call of duty and protect her family. For her, nation and duty came first!

Like most of her colleagues and seniors, she has to keep her emotions aside while dealing with Covid patients and their families. If they know a patient is at the threshold of death, doctors begin preparing the family, which is already devastated trying to arrange for funds for their loved one’s treatment. Further, the aggrieved family cannot give the departed soul the funeral they deserve as they cannot see or touch the infected body. Often the doctor is brutally blamed for the death but once again our medics are trained to understand the emotions of the common man amid grief. But do you understand a doctor’s life during Covid times ?

The deadly virus has not only gripped the body and mind of each patient in the ICU ward, but it also takes its toll on the emotional health of each medical personnel. Yet, they have to keep sane and return home to their families and behave ‘normal’. Not to forget, they are almost treated as ‘untouchables’ even though they are not Covid positive ! Though the PPE kit drops off at the hospital premises, the sense of duty does not, as they wash their clothes separately, sweep their rooms on their own and food is served in different utensils at a safe distance. Just like prisoners served food separately in jail! The support of an entire worried family is behind each Covid warrior who is trying to save your life, please don’t forget that! So, please be responsible citizens and get yourself vaccinated at the earliest and do not land up in Covid wards, so our doctors and their families can take a breather!

No, they don’t feel scared for themselves, as they know they may have already acquired the virus being in the hospital 24x7, but they are scared for their families’ safety! Can you imagine the inner conflict these doctors undergo? To save helpless patients they don’t know in an ICU ward and then return home, tired, in an isolated room and unable to meet their own family just to protect them? Who do they choose? Or should they choose anyone at all? They just continue doing their duties with empathy and compassion.

As a mother who is worried all the time but proud all the same, I stood by my daughter when duty called, turning a deaf ear to hearsay! Because I read a line somewhere which said, “Virus is everywhere, but so is Waheguru”. Ultimately, she and each Covid warrior fighting out there are in His hands too.

(The writer is a Panchkula-based author)