COVER STORY Were you concerned about getting infected? Was your wife? My wife was really supportive of the project, and she knows that I try to be safe when I go out and shoot. She also recognized the importance of going in there and documenting this. I had on full PPE and didn’t actually enter patients’ rooms. They were sealed off. I also had a doctor with me the whole time to make sure I didn’t compromise my safety or anyone else’s. I got tested a couple days later, which came back negative, and then again the next week. I’ve been trying to get tested every week. You’ve been in war zones and other hairy situations. How did this experience compare? It’s difficult in any situation to watch sick people or people dying. But this wasn’t like a war zone, where I have to be diligent and check behind me all the time. And it wasn’t like a fire or natural disaster, where I also have to be on my toes and constantly aware of my movements. In this situation, I concentrated a lot more on everybody else. I felt more focused on what they were doing instead of what I was doing. There were some moments that were just really sad, though. One nurse said to me, “Last week, we had a day where five people died.” That was hard on everyone, she said. It made me stop and think about my grandparents and family members, and it was like, “This is a real thing. This can happen to anyone.” For instance, my sister got it and was very sick. She recovered, but she’s in the category of underlying conditions, so it could have gotten real bad real fast. Did anything surprise you? It was a little shocking to watch one of the nurses talk to the family of a sedated patient on an iPad. It was pretty surreal. Watching someone being intubated was intense, too. I’ve seen it on TV shows and stuff, but it’s a lot different in real life…. The doctors said they’ve gone from performing a couple of them a month to sometimes multiple a day.
Dr. Barry Feldman interacts with a patient.
Were there any positive moments? A doctor explained to me how they would look for small wins, like taking someone off a ventilator or seeing their status improve. They would remember those moments and try to keep moving forward. One of the nurses, Lois McKinley, just had so much care, so much honor being there and treating patients. She’s the one in the picture holding the patient’s hand. That person was sedated on a ventilator. When she came out of the room, she turned the lights off and just stood outside and watched them for a minute before speaking with the doctor. I mean, she really cared about each individual patient. I don’t want to speak for her, but seeing some of her patients die — that has to take a toll on her. But she’s doing everything she can. Dr. Barry Feldman was the one who was there on his day off. He was really concerned about the recent spike. I felt like he knew everything about each patient, and he seemed to have a good sense of everything that was going on. He stood out to me as someone who was just very passionate and very knowledgeable and doing everything he could to keep everyone alive, and hopefully recover. Some of these images are hard to look at. Why is it so important for people to see them? For one, I think there’s still a lot of people who still don’t take COVID seriously enough. There’s a lot of people who say, “Oh well, I might get minor symptoms, but I’ll be okay.” But I saw patients in the ICU who were normal and healthy before they went in and now they’re fighting for their lives on a ventilator. I also think it’s important to recognize that it’s selfish to not take it seriously. “I don’t have to wear a mask, I can go party with people I don’t know, yada, yada.” There are repercussions. It’s not just about you. If you get sick, it affects these people who are working in these hospitals and are burned out. They’re working 12-hour shifts and then have to go home to their family or partner and put on a happy face and try to go to sleep. Day in and day out. I honestly don’t feel like we give them enough credit. And I want people to see — to really see — what they go through. n
At left, a respiratory therapist monitors his patient; at right, a registered nurse inserts a PICC line. INDEPENDENT.COM
MARCH 4, 2021
THE INDEPENDENT
17