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Gene Qin was so worried the coronavirus coursing through his system would kill him that he tried to keep himself awake all night so it wouldn’t take him in his sleep.
At age 72 with a history of heart spasms, he figured he was a prime candidate for succumbing to the pandemic that is taking an especially high toll on older people.
He doesn’t understand it, but somehow this former passenger of the virus-stricken Grand Princess cruise ship survived after being quarantined for a week in a San Carlos hotel then hospitalized. Qin, whose story was featured after he tested positive test last month, is now in his San Francisco home recovering.
But fear lingers.
“Even now,” he said, “I never think I’m out of danger.”
With so little information or data about who survives and who doesn’t, who is contagious and who isn’t, people recovering from the virus are wondering whether they are truly cured. Are they now immune? Or could the toll of living through COVID-19 have been so stressful that other unforeseen health problems will soon sneak up on them?
“I don’t know, can it come back?” asked Casey Council-Geha, 44, of Pleasant Hill, who said she felt “hit by a truck” by the virus that struck several weeks ago.
Of the million confirmed cases globally, more than 58,000 people have died. But more than 225,000 have recovered, according to John Hopkins University which is tracking the numbers. Experts expect that those who recover will have built up immunities against the disease and are no longer a threat to others. Antibody tests becoming available may soon help determine that. But there is still much unknown about the fast-moving virus that was first reported in late December — especially understanding who is contagious and for how long.
“I totally understand the anxiety, and it’s probably a normal way to feel,” said Dr. Brian Schwartz, who specializes in infectious diseases at UC San Francisco. “We’re all trying really hard to learn, and there’s research being done to put all the pieces together.”
Although the virus has hit the elderly and infirm especially hard, it’s also targeting healthy people. Council-Geha’s husband, Rick Geha, is 62, but does 140 pushups a day and never had so much as the flu in his life. He never missed a day in high school.
“I thought I was bulletproof,” said Geha, whose son is a reporter for the Bay Area News Group. The virus struck him the worst last weekend — a week after his wife fell ill — and was humbling, he said.
“I thought my world was coming to an end.”
To help him cope, he took to Facebook Live and spoke to his friends about his experience and his gratitude for recovering.
He’s been following guidance from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention ever since, keeping quarantine for at least three days after the fever passed without medication, and at least seven days since symptoms first appeared. Improvement of respiratory symptoms is also required. Geha took a two-mile walk with his wife the other day, “but the closest we got to anyone was 100 yards.”
Adding to the uncertainty is the CDC’s evolving federal guidelines, which are considered “interim” and note that they are open to adaptation by local and state health officials. Passengers from the Grand Princess, for instance, were originally told while being quarantined at Travis Force Base last month that they needed to test negative twice before they could be sent home.
“But the understanding now is that that doesn’t make a lot of sense,” Schwartz, the UCSF doctor, said. “We’re understanding you can shed the virus and have positive tests for a long time, but not be contagious.”
Qin, who retired in 2016 from UCSF Benioff Children’s Hospital where he ran a clinical lab, isn’t taking any chances.
He’s been out of the hospital for two weeks but is living in a bedroom separate from his wife, Diana Gong. She cooks for him, but they eat separately. They both wear masks if they pass each other in the living room.
After his week-long stay at the quarantined hotel — where he was sequestered on the third floor and his wife on the first — Qin was ultimately admitted to UCSF Medical Center on March 20. The next day, the fever that had ravaged him for a week vanished without treatment. A chest X-ray showed inflammation in one lung. He was released three days later.
But after being denied a follow-up test that he hoped would prove he is coronavirus free, he still has many questions about his health and his future. He certainly can’t take care of his grandchildren, he said, which he and Gong used to do several days a week, and he has no idea when the stigma of the disease, much less the virus itself, will be over.
“All my friends and relatives know I was tested positive,” Qin said. “Voluntarily, I would not contact them. Even two months later, I would not have contact with them face-to-face.”
He’s also concerned about his pre-existing condition, which is flaring up. In 2016, he was diagnosed with spasms in a coronary blood vessel, which only bothered him occasionally going upstairs. Now, they seem nearly chronic.
“When I get out of bed and just walk in the room in the house, the pressure on my chest is significant,” he said. “I cannot say if this was caused by the virus or it has made my pre-existing condition worse.”
Qin’s journey, which started on a vacation cruise to Hawaii with his wife in mid-February, has taken so many turns that his son, Edward, said Tuesday, “It’s like the movie Contagion, except it doesn’t end in two hours.”
Gong was actually the first to get sick, with a fever and cough while still onboard the infected Grand Princess as it idled off the coast of San Francisco. Their story became public when Qin, frustrated that the medical team on board seemed to be ignoring his calls for help, recorded a video from their quarantined stateroom, begging that they be allowed off the ship to “save our lives.”
His wife improved, but after the couple were bused to Travis Air Force Base, Qin came down with the same fever and cough. After being transferred to the Fairfield Inn in San Carlos, Gong tested negative for the virus and he tested positive.
That’s when he feared the worst. He had heard stories that coronavirus patients could be hit by a “cytokine storm,” where an overly exuberant immune system can attack itself and his condition could deteriorate rapidly.
“I didn’t know if I would be able to pick up the phone to save myself,” he said. “I thought I could die alone.”
Gene Qin has an upcoming appointment with his cardiologist to assess the pressure on his chest. But he’s afraid he may never get the answers he really wants about the coronavirus.
“I really want to see my results be negative,” he said.
Council-Geha, who is a week further along in her recovery than her husband, is trying to stay positive in the midst of uncertainty.
“Here’s what I do know,” she said. “Anxiety comes from fear of the future and anxiety weakens your immune system. So my approach in life is I’m going to take each day as it comes.”
