Italian nurse on coronavirus duty sees the nightmare return

A 54-year-old nurse became convinced coronavirus “hated” her during first seven months of Italy’s outbreaks. Those are Cristina Settembrese's words for it.

Settembrese, who specializes in treating patients with infectious diseases, faced huge risks during long hours she spent in close contact with sick and dying COVID-19 patients. She was careful to scale her precautions to match and always tested negative despite getting exposed multiple times.

nurse's encounters with coronavirus started Feb. 21, day Italy’s first domestic cases were confirmed in country's rth. Nurses and doctors were among newly infected, so Settembrese immediately volunteered to care for people in Codog, home to Italy's patient zero and just an hour’s drive away from where she worked at Milan’s San Paolo Hospital.

Soon, her own hospital was under siege as virus spre in Lombardy region, its first foothold beyond Asia. Settembrese, a single mor, immediately sent her 24-year-old daughter to live with her parents . Alone at home, nurse slept on couch, partly to be rey in case she was called in to work, partly as a response to a trauma that took her by surprise.

When case numbers finally decreased and her hospital emptied of COVID-19 patients, she found it hard to share relief she observed in or people, those who h t seen trauma of her ward. On a short summer break, she saw virus' fall return in unmasked faces of fellow vacationers. And her worry grew.

Still, resurgence came quicker -- and earlier -- than even Settembrese feared. This week alone, number of cases in her hospital surged by one-third. It also showed up closer to home.

Here, in her words, is her journey through pandemic, so far.

ITALY’S BRIEF VIRUS RESPITE

“By August, we h more missions for COVID. We h almost a month without any cases. And from September, inste we started to see again some pneumonia, n some patients with COVID, still t serious cases, and we closed ward for patients with meningitis, tuberculosis, our usual patients....n as cases increased and hospital missions went up, pneumonia got more aggressive, forcing m to reopen intensive ward upstairs. switch has happened: virulence is much stronger, and we see it in patients.”

MID-OCTOBER SURGE

“I can say on a numeric level, numbers have soared....Nurses have been recalled from wards y h gone back to. We are calling m back to help us, because alone we cant keep up. re are just a few of us, and we cant keep up with people who are wearing helmets (to assist breathing)."

NIGHTMARE RETURNS

“I am experiencing this very bly. I didn’t honestly expect to. I cried a lot, four months ago, I cried really a lot. I lost many young people, who I still carry with me. I hn’t yet overcome se deaths....All of us nurses, we are feeling a psychological dam. I am experiencing this as a second wave, and I think we still have seen thing.

“re are t terrible deaths this time. w, with treatments, you man to avoid se intensive rapies. We have found a pseudo-palliative treatment, let’s say. We kw how to man cases better.

“But I am experiencing it inside exactly like before. For us, it is like reliving a nightmare.“

LOOKING BACK AT ITALY’S REMARKABLY RELAXED SUMMER

“I h seven or eight days of vacation and I joined my mor in Riccione (on riatic Sea), and I was an alien. I was seeing everyone without masks, this beach full of people. Crowds in bars. And only ones with masks were Lombards, and ors, all without.

“I told m all off. It was as if I was in a frenzy. I would say, ‘Move apart and put on masks.’ I was extremely worried. I would watch and think about October, and I would say to my mor and daughter, ‘With free-for-all that is happening, we will be facing disaster.’ Everyone told me I was an alarmist, even friends. I told m: ‘I am t an alarmist. I have worked in infectious diseases ward for 12 years, and virus will return. Because all viruses return in October. And this one won’t be missing, for sure.’”

FLASHBACKS FROM A PANDEMIC

“This young man still pulls at my heart. It is a terrible, terrible story. He was a 42-year-old guy. When he arrived, he was in pretty good shape, n we h to intubate him, with anessiologist. I held his hands, and he said, ‘Cristina, swear to me that I will wake up, because I have two small children.’ And to help him go to sleep calmly, I promised him. It is a promise I could t keep, because after four or five days, patient died. I was a mess. I am still carrying this.

“Often, when I go into a room, I see people who were re before. All beds have faces. y have faces that I remember. Sometimes I have nightmares, I am t ashamed to say. I am having flashbacks that are heavy psychologically.... I still cant go to sleep in a bed because I associate it with illness, something I never felt in 35 years working as a nurse. Slowly, I will get over it. But I have been sleeping on sofa since March. I cant get in a bed.“

HITTING HOME

“ or day I was destroyed, as if I h spent whole day doing backbreaking work in fields. When I couldn’t smell or taste anything, I went and got tested. Damn! I can say I am positive, but I don’t have major symptoms. I don’t have a fever, just some coughing and aches everywhere, like a terrible, terrible flu.

"In end, virus doesn’t hate me. My defenses were down. I worked too many hours, always wearing a mask and maintaining a distance. I have idea where I got it. w my daughter, who came here a few times to eat between shifts, has a fever, with a heache. She h a test yesterday. I am very worried, and feel very guilty.”