An update now on my co-worker.  Last week I learned, through another co-worker, that she came down with COVID-19.  I talked about it, but frankly, I made it about me and how I now have to worry about contracting it.

I really shouldn't have, and I was a dick for being so self-centered.  Well ... I had to worry about it, and I still need to make sure I didn't get the coronavirus from her.  But I just looked back at how I blog posted about her plight through the prism of how it affected me.  That wasn't right, I am wrong, and I feel guilty about putting it that way -- especially in light of news I got yesterday.

The same co-worker who told me she got COVID said at work that she thought about texting her over the weekend to see how she's doing.  But before she did, she received a text from her sister.  She's in the hospital now.  In the Intensive Care Unit.  She has not been intubated yet, but the decision was made to get her to the hospital in case that needed to be done.

I remember early in the pandemic seeing statistics of a person's chances of surviving once he or she got the virus -- a percentage would be asymptomatic, a smaller percentage would go to the hospital, go to the ICU, put on a ventilator, etc. ... the bar would get shorter and shorter until the graph/triangle ends at a point at the bottom, marking the percentage that dies from COVID-19.  My co-worker -- who, by the way, had gotten her second shot of the vaccine, though I don't know when in relation to when she got infected -- is falling through these cracks, so to speak.  I want to think that the mortality rate for people in her position is a lot better now than during the onset of the pandemic because hospitals now have experience as to what works to save people; the latest article online that I can find, from November, confirms my hunch.  But then again, if she had just gotten her second shot, should she really be in the hospital?  And if it's anticipated she will need to be hooked up to the ventilator ... won't her life be in jeopardy?

I still can't believe that my co-worker is in this position.  One of the last times I saw her was when we were cut from work early; I opened the door on my way out, I saw her waiting for her ride, I waved to her and she waved back.  Didn't think much of it.  I lost one Facebook friend to the coronavirus, and a good friend of mine survived a hellacious bout with it.  But if only by physical proximity, this is affecting my life a lot more.  So to hell with worrying about whether she gave me the 'Rona.  I have to hope I'll be able to see her again, for God's sake.