So, it looks like the kids and I had Covid over the last couple of weeks. Here is the whole story... because y'all are jobless and like reading stories on FB.
Two Sundays ago (26 Sep) we were "galivanting about Goa" (as Tarun likes to put it). We assumed that swimming in a warm river on a warm day gave us a cold. The kids were mildly sick through the week. I got more than mildly sick by Thursday (30 Sep), got a two minute online consultation with my doc back in Gurgaon, and was prescribed antibiotics for my chest infection.
Saturday night (2 Oct) we learnt that our cook is hospitalised with Covid. Being decent folk, first thing on Sunday morning we went to Asilo† to get tested. Kavin and I tested negative but Nilay, bada bing bada boom, positive. This was quite unexpected. We were asked to meet the casualty duty doctor. She was a very nice lady, and gave us all the medicines Nilay needed. She also had a long and calm chat with Nilay about all the care he needed to take.
He wasn't feeling too sick, but we had to quarantine Nilay in a room and bore him to death anyway. On Tuesday (4 Oct) Kavin and I went back to Asilo for another round of RAT and RTPCR tests. Negative again. This time the nurses made us meet the OPD doctor. Now, I can't recall the conversation with the doctor verbatim, but this is broadly how it went:
"So you're saying that all of you had a cold last week. But it was not Covid, just a cold, even though you did not get tested. Then on Tuesday your cook traveled from Hubli and Wednesday and Thursday she came to work and then she fell sick on Thursday and now she has Covid. You suspect she got Covid from Hubli and gave it to your son. Maybe all of you had Covid all the while and gave it to her - these things are not easy to say. And now you are saying that your elder son is positive but you both, who live in the same house with him, don't have Covid, just because you tested negative twice. Sir we have to use our mind, we cannot just go by test reports. We three are all in this room. Is it possible that one of us has Covid and the other two do not? It is not possible - you know this disease well. So I will treat you both for Covid. Anyway you are fully vaccinated with CoviShield, so the effect of the disease will be very mild for you. You have already had antibiotics. I will prescribe them to Kevin also here. And all of you get blood tests please."
Kavin was quite surprised that everything at the hospital - rapid antigen test, RTPCR, doctor's consultation, expensive blood tests like Ferritin and D-Dimer, medicines - everything was free, and we didn't even have to wait too long (3-4 folks ahead of us in each queue). I told him it isn't free - he pays for it every time he buys a packet of Parle G.
Anyway. Public health in Goa gets a 4-star rating from me. Government hospital doctors have their ears to the pulse (see Yashodhara, I can mix metaphors whenever and wherever) of the wider public, and know much more about pandemics than expensive private doctors who are only catering to the "echelons" of society. Which is why I did not spend another ₹1,000 on a follow up consultation with my family doctor on the 3rd of October - she hadn't prescribed me blood tests or a Covid test, even though I'd had a prolonged "cold".
It looks to me like Covid has replaced the common cold and influenza as the most prevalent coronavirus. The doctor at Asilo felt that the Sars-Cov-2 virus will become endemic pretty soon.
I had full scale panic on the night of the 3rd. I assumed a replay of my sickness from an year ago, when I ended up in the ICU struggling to breathe. I was back in that room, sweating, being told by the ward girls to soldier on for the sake of my kids. Worried, I hammered out a document with useful information for my friends and relatives in case I end up hospitalised. (And I'm not even embarassed I did it 😂 )
† North Goa District Hospital, Mapusa. Higher than PHCs, SHCs in the public healthcare foodchain. The word asilo literally means asylum or hospice in Portuguese.
Two Sundays ago (26 Sep) we were "galivanting about Goa" (as Tarun likes to put it). We assumed that swimming in a warm river on a warm day gave us a cold. The kids were mildly sick through the week. I got more than mildly sick by Thursday (30 Sep), got a two minute online consultation with my doc back in Gurgaon, and was prescribed antibiotics for my chest infection.
Saturday night (2 Oct) we learnt that our cook is hospitalised with Covid. Being decent folk, first thing on Sunday morning we went to Asilo† to get tested. Kavin and I tested negative but Nilay, bada bing bada boom, positive. This was quite unexpected. We were asked to meet the casualty duty doctor. She was a very nice lady, and gave us all the medicines Nilay needed. She also had a long and calm chat with Nilay about all the care he needed to take.
He wasn't feeling too sick, but we had to quarantine Nilay in a room and bore him to death anyway. On Tuesday (4 Oct) Kavin and I went back to Asilo for another round of RAT and RTPCR tests. Negative again. This time the nurses made us meet the OPD doctor. Now, I can't recall the conversation with the doctor verbatim, but this is broadly how it went:
"So you're saying that all of you had a cold last week. But it was not Covid, just a cold, even though you did not get tested. Then on Tuesday your cook traveled from Hubli and Wednesday and Thursday she came to work and then she fell sick on Thursday and now she has Covid. You suspect she got Covid from Hubli and gave it to your son. Maybe all of you had Covid all the while and gave it to her - these things are not easy to say. And now you are saying that your elder son is positive but you both, who live in the same house with him, don't have Covid, just because you tested negative twice. Sir we have to use our mind, we cannot just go by test reports. We three are all in this room. Is it possible that one of us has Covid and the other two do not? It is not possible - you know this disease well. So I will treat you both for Covid. Anyway you are fully vaccinated with CoviShield, so the effect of the disease will be very mild for you. You have already had antibiotics. I will prescribe them to Kevin also here. And all of you get blood tests please."
Kavin was quite surprised that everything at the hospital - rapid antigen test, RTPCR, doctor's consultation, expensive blood tests like Ferritin and D-Dimer, medicines - everything was free, and we didn't even have to wait too long (3-4 folks ahead of us in each queue). I told him it isn't free - he pays for it every time he buys a packet of Parle G.
Anyway. Public health in Goa gets a 4-star rating from me. Government hospital doctors have their ears to the pulse (see Yashodhara, I can mix metaphors whenever and wherever) of the wider public, and know much more about pandemics than expensive private doctors who are only catering to the "echelons" of society. Which is why I did not spend another ₹1,000 on a follow up consultation with my family doctor on the 3rd of October - she hadn't prescribed me blood tests or a Covid test, even though I'd had a prolonged "cold".
It looks to me like Covid has replaced the common cold and influenza as the most prevalent coronavirus. The doctor at Asilo felt that the Sars-Cov-2 virus will become endemic pretty soon.
I had full scale panic on the night of the 3rd. I assumed a replay of my sickness from an year ago, when I ended up in the ICU struggling to breathe. I was back in that room, sweating, being told by the ward girls to soldier on for the sake of my kids. Worried, I hammered out a document with useful information for my friends and relatives in case I end up hospitalised. (And I'm not even embarassed I did it 😂 )
† North Goa District Hospital, Mapusa. Higher than PHCs, SHCs in the public healthcare foodchain. The word asilo literally means asylum or hospice in Portuguese.