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Dr Brytney Cobia said Monday that all but one of his COVID patients in Alabama had not received the vaccine. The vaccinated patient, she said, just needed some oxygen and should make a full recovery. Some of the rest are dying.
“I’m admitting healthy young people with very serious COVID infections to the hospital,” Cobia, a hospitalist at Birmingham’s Grandview Medical Center, wrote in a moving Facebook post on Sunday. “One of the last things they do before they are intubated is begging me for the vaccine. I hold their hand and tell them I’m sorry, but it’s too late.
Three COVID-19 vaccines have been widely available in Alabama for months now, but the state is the last in the country in terms of vaccination rates, with only 33.7% of the population fully vaccinated. The number of COVID-19 cases and hospitalizations are rising yet again due to the more contagious Delta variant of the virus and Alabama’s low vaccination rate.
During the first year and a half of the pandemic, Cobia and hundreds of other doctors in Alabama who are caring for critically ill COVID-19 patients have worked to save as many as possible.
“In 2020 and early 2021, when the vaccine wasn’t available, it was just tragedy after tragedy after tragedy,” Cobia told AL.com this week. “You know, so many people who did all the right things, and yet walked in, and got seriously ill and died.”
In the United States, COVID is now an unvaccinated pandemic, according to the head of the United States Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. In Alabama, state officials report that 94% of COVID hospital patients and 96% of Alabamians who have died from COVID since April were not fully immunized.
“A few days later when I call the time of death,” Cobia continued on Facebook, “I hug their family members and tell them that the best way to honor their loved one is to ‘go get the shot and encourage everyone they know to do the same. “
“They cry. And they tell me they didn’t know. They thought it was a hoax. They thought it was political. They thought because they had a certain blood type or a certain skin color. , they wouldn’t get that sick. They thought it was “just the flu.” But they were wrong. And they wish they could go back. But they can’t. So they thank me and they go get the shot. And I go back to my office, I write their obituaries and I say a little prayer that this loss will save more lives.
More than 11,400 Alabamians have died from COVID so far, but in mid-2021 caring for COVID patients is a different story than it was when it started. Cobia has said that it is mentally and emotionally different to care for someone who could have prevented their illness but chose not to.
“You go there thinking, ‘Okay, I’m not going to feel bad for this person because they are making their own choice,’” Cobia said. “But then you actually see them, you see them face to face, and it really changes your whole perspective, because it’s always just a person who thinks they made the best decision possible with the information.” it has, and all the misinformation going around.
“And now all you really see is their fear and regret. And even though I can walk into the room thinking, “Okay, it’s your fault you did this to yourself”, when I leave the room I just see a person who is really in pain, and that is so unfortunate for the choice they made. “
Cobia said the pressure is on healthcare workers after the trauma of 2020 and 2021.
“It’s really difficult because all of us doctors and other medical staff have been doing this for a long time and we are all very, at this point, tired, emotionally exhausted and cynical,” she said.
Cobia said the current wave of Delta patients reminded her of the days of October and November 2020, just before Alabama’s peak in coronavirus cases and deaths.
“What we saw in December 2020 and January 2021 was the absolute peak, the peak of the pandemic, where I was signing 10 death certificates a day,” she said. “Now it’s definitely not like that, but it probably reminds of October, November 2020, where we know there are a lot of great things to come.”
Cobia fears that the next school year will lead to a similar increase.
“All of these children are about to go back to school. No mask warrant is in place, 70% of Alabama is unvaccinated. Of course, most children don’t get vaccinated because they can’t be, ”Cobia said. “So that looks like a looming disaster, basically. “
Drs. Miles and Brytney Cobia with children Carter and Claire.
Cobia also had personal experience with the virus, contracting it in July when she was 27 weeks pregnant with her second child. Her symptoms were mild and the child, Carter, gave birth prematurely out of caution but did not experience any serious complications.
Her husband, Miles, is also a doctor, and the couple say they were both extremely careful about wearing protective gear, but one of them caught the virus anyway and gave it away. to the other, as well as to other family members.
“We always went to work but we masked ourselves 100% of the time,” said Cobia. “We didn’t go anywhere or do anything, we ordered through Shipt for all of our groceries, we didn’t do anything at the time.”
Cobia said she gave birth in September without incident and received the vaccine herself in December when it was made available to healthcare workers.
“I didn’t hesitate to get it,” she said. “There were a lot of unknowns at that time, because I was still breastfeeding whether it was safe or not. I talked to as many other medical colleagues as I could and talked with my OB to find out what data she had and I decided to continue breastfeeding after the vaccination.
For people who are hesitant to receive the vaccine, Cobia recommends talking to their primary care doctor about their concerns, just like she did.
“I try not to be judgmental when I get a new COVID patient who is not vaccinated, but I really just started asking them, ‘Why didn’t you get the vaccine? “And I’m just going to ask the question blank, in the least critical way possible,” she said. “And most of them, they’re very honest, they give me answers. “I talked to this person, I saw this thing on Facebook, I got this email, I saw this on the news”, you know, those are all the reasons I didn’t not vaccinated.
“And the only question I always ask them is, have you made an appointment with your GP and asked for his or her opinion on whether or not you should get the vaccine?” And so far no one has answered yes to this question.
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