Bug Fix

Tuesday I was speaking to someone I know well who lives in a large metropolitan area in another state.  This person is a hermit.  He/she generally doesn't socialize and does little shopping or traveling or moving about.  He/she told me that he/she had just recovered from COVID-19. But was not a statistic because a doctor or test was never consulted.  How is he/she sure that it was the virus?  Extreme exhaustion and fevers that lasted about ten days, a blood clot in his/her leg (no doctor was consulted, but the leg swelled up twice the normal size), not a lot of coughing but difficulty breathing, no taste or smell senses and perhaps some other symptoms that I forget at the moment.  Sounds like the virus and a medical professional should have been consulted for this 61 year old, but it is all over now.

I am thankful that he/she survived.  I have promised not to reveal identities of this individual.  The reason why I want to mention this is--this person was socially distanced. This person grocery shopped once a week in a not busy store without a mask (but they say that this mask thing protects others), occasionally got fast food with drive up and otherwise stayed home.  He/she admitted not wiping down groceries when they came into the house. Hand washing was adhered to though. Mail was not sanitized.  He /she hiked outside on a trail, socially distancing from other hikers.  The grocery store had to be the most likely place this virus was picked up.

I had been reading that the grocery store as a patron was not a place to be very concerned about the virus if normal precautions--washing hands, socially distancing, etc. were taken.  People working there needed to be concerned.  He/she got a pretty severe case of the virus, so if the articles I have read are to be believed, there must have been a pretty high viral load.  The air in the grocery store?  The air on the trail outdoors?  The grocery items or mail with virus on it?  Just back luck, I suppose.  Good luck that he/she survived and wasn't consumed by his or her cat.

I will continue to live life in hiding from this virus.  The relative safety I felt with my limited contact with others is shattered.  I will wipe down my groceries, continue to go shopping when necessary at the times set aside for the elderly, and be very, very careful.  I for one (and not just one I am sure), am praying for a vaccine, fast, soon, effective and treatments.  Many treatments that work.  And I pray that none of you get this bad bug and that I don't either.