Isolation

It began as something of a demonstration project, not exactly a lark but certainly not a prank, yet undertaken a little light-heartedly, the underlying seriousness of the mission offset by the absence of any suggestion of an undesired, unanticipated result. And then came the undesired, unanticipated result: a second line on that rapid-result home test, the line that appeared beneath the “T.” It was the line that told me, would tell any responsible individual, to go home and stay there for a minimum of five days, though better ten.

The simple, do-it-yourself test returned its diagnosis in less than 15 minutes. A second, more sophisticated exam that afternoon required several hours to deliver its accounting, and it provided additional confirmation. No mistake: Covid-19. Quite probably the omicron variant.

Why me? Me, at the time totally asymptomatic: No fever, no chills; no coughing or sneezing; no aches or pains; no loss of smell or taste. Fatigue? No. Diarrhea? Thank you, no. Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome — that’s the SARS in SARS-CoV-2, the virus that the world has come to shorthand as Covid-19. I had no difficulty in breathing, no shortness of breath.

Me, having happily taken both doses of the Pfizer vaccine at the earliest opportunity, just as the snows of last February were melting; me, having enthusiastically rolled up my sleeve for the third jab, the booster, later in ’21. Me, who tried to be as conscientious as the clinical community had urged — limiting my exposure to others, avoiding crowds, masking outside the home and office. Me, having washed my hands so often and coated them so frequently with sanitizer that the dermis surely surrendered a layer or so.

So, why me? Well, why not me? As a breakthrough case — fully immunized and booster-ed, cautious (I believe) to a fault, but nonetheless inadvertently hosting the omicron variant — I had three-quarters of a million fellow Arkansans as companions in Covid. More than 9,500 of those cases are no longer among us. I thought of them, not infrequently. They, and the fact that I could have been infected for as long as ten days before my first test, and may have unknowingly communicated the virus to an unknown, unknowable number of others. So whatever Covid’s inconvenience to me, keeping that in mind helped keep things in solemn perspective.

Within a day or so of my first test, it seemed that every relative, friend or acquaintance knew that I had returned positive for the virus. The office line, the home phone, the cells (mine and my wife’s) kept ringing, callers asking if groceries or prescriptions or sundries needed to be fetched. Similar offers of assistance arrived in cascades of text messages and e-mails. Almost all of those expressed the hope that I would “feel better soon.” To each, I or my wife offered assurances that I was feeling fine, just fine, that there was no need of get-well cards nor, please, casseroles.

Then on Sunday afternoon, the tenth day after that little line appeared beneath the “T,” another in a series of rapid at-home tests, and this time the little line didn’t appear. I took a few minutes in quiet celebration — Was it really not there? Was I merely wishing it not there, imagining its absence? — before sharing the news with my wife. Then I photographed the test’s negative message, that blank space beneath the “T, “and dispatched it, with no elaboration, to everyone who had wondered if my will was in order. An ego out of control, mine.

There emerged, quickly, a public policy message in one man’s brush with coronavirus: The overwhelming majority of those who viewed the photograph had no idea what it signified. Indeed a great many feared the worst. Which underscored that not only were they as vaccinated as me (and luckier, or more cautious) but that they were in that strata that made them much less likely to contract Covid or even to suspect as much and thus be experienced with the test. Which is to say, they were almost all white; and among those of color — African-American, Asian, Hispanic — I cannot think of even one who is (a) less than middle-class economically, (b) without excellent health insurance and (c) of such temperament as to rely for medical guidance on reputable physicians rather than grandstanding politicians.

Even as one guy was reveling in his own recovery from an ailment he never felt, his state’s hospitals were recording a record number of Covid in-patients, including a new high in daily admissions. Gov. Hutchinson is requesting $4.7 million in additional funding to open additional beds at UAMS. There will be many more lines under many more “T”s before there is daylight.

(EDITOR’S NOTE: Steve Barnes is a columnist with Editorial Associates in Little Rock.)