Youths regret passing virus to elders: Turkish doctor

MARDIN/DIYARBAKIR, Turkey

A doctor in southeastern Turkey said Tuesday that physicians are seeing young people with a lot of remorse over transmitting the coronavirus to older people in their households.

“People must comply with social distancing, wearing a mask and hygiene rules, regardless of whether they are young or old,” said Refika Yorulmaz Cakmak, who works at the COVID-19 intensive care unit at a state hospital in Mardin province. “We see the regret of infecting older relatives in the young.”

Cakmak said medical professionals have gone through an intense process since March when the virus was first detected in Turkey and warned that young people suffer a lot of remorse when they come to the intensive care unit to see their relatives or sometimes lose loved ones to the disease.

She said she contracted the novel coronavirus while working at the hospital.

“I was first afraid that it would go down to my lungs. I was also psychologically affected by the fear of death,” she told Anadolu Agency while noting there were people around her who greatly suffered from the disease.

After recovering and returning to work, she increased measures to lessen her chances of being infected a second time.

She stressed that those who recover should be careful because there is a chance of a second infection. “Patients who contract COVID-19 for the second time are admitted to hospital,” said Cakmak.

She said if a young person becomes infected, it does not mean the disease would not infect family members, as she highlighted that the elderly are at a higher risk for experiencing more difficult situations when they contract the disease than younger patients.

"We had around five, six patients who got the disease twice. They say that after recovering from the disease, they decreased measures thinking that they would not be infected again,” she added.

Cakmak had advice to everyone: if even one person is not wearing a mask, it is a high-risk situation for transmitting the virus. “Both sides should wear masks. Social distancing is also a must,” she said.

Mask is a need like shoes

Feyzi Celik, who works at Dicle University Hospital in southeastern Diyarbakir contracted the virus three months ago and had to isolate at home to protect his wife and children.

“My son could not bear it and wanted to come to my room but I did not let him in,” said the doctor.

He said after experiencing the same process during his course with the disease as his patients, he understood how hard the despair had been.

“There is a war. We are the soldiers fighting at the forefront of the war,” said Celik, who returned to work after his recovery.

He lost friends working in the intensive care unit and said there had been very painful and traumatic experiences.

“Measures are needed to escape this disease. People should not remove their masks in closed areas.

“Just like how we cannot go out without shoes, we shouldn’t go around without a mask, as well," he said.

*Writing by Sena Guler