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dont let this printemergency physician working in a Tennessee hospital
said. “And if it doesn’t get contaminated, [I’m] sup-
posed to reuse it the next day.” One New York anesthe-
siologist said his team was asked to use just one N95 per
week. Under normal circumstances, he said, he would
use one per patient to prevent the spread of disease.
In Los Angeles County, where there are at least 662
confirmed patients a nd 1 1 deaths, hospital admin-
istrators suggested that health care workers s ource
their own PPE. “We have been encouraged t o go to
Home Depot and buy our own eyewear,” a Los Ange-
les nurse says. Due to a shortage in blood-drive dona-
tions, she and her colleagues have also been asked to
give blood. She ruefully quips that her job is literally
blood, sweat and tears.
In Pittsburgh, a labor and delivery nurse says her
team is now permitted to wear surgical masks only
during cesarean sections, despite frequent visits
from other staff a nd unscreened patients who come
from at-risk floors. “I’m mentally and physically ex-
hausted,” t he n urs e s ays. “I’m here to help the com-
munity, but at the same time, I’m probably exposing
them.” Other health care providers worry a bout e x-
posing one another: doctors and nurses tend to work
in close quarters, touching the same keyboards, clip-
boards and doorknobs.
That’s a problem for each provider, says former
CDC director Dr. Tom Frieden, but it’s also a problem
for society writ large. “Ultimately, health care provid-
ers can’t save your life if they can’t protect their own,
and they n eed a dequate s upplies of personal protec-
tive equipment to do it,” he tells TIME.
The lack of PPE has cascading effects, several
health care workers explain. Because there are so fewN95 masks, hospital administrators are making their
supply difficult to access, leaving doctors and nurses
in the lurch. Recently, when the Tennessee emergency
physician was treating a critically ill patient with a
high risk of blood contamination, she couldn’t find any
masks with face shields. “That was scary,” she says.
Not being prepared with basic protective equip-
ment also compounds the psychological c hallenges
of c ombating an invisible enemy in the midst of a
global pandemic. “It’s pretty overwhelming,” says the
Tennessee doctor, through tears. “This is the most
anxious I’ve ever felt in my entire life.”
In Italy, where COVID-19 has killed more than
6,500 people, many doctors have been forced to
make gut-wrenching decisions about which o f t heir
patients get a ventilator, a lifesaving breathing ma-
chine, a nd which do not. Areas in both Italy and the
U.S. face a critical shortage of the device. “What I’d
like to tell my American colleagues is, Be p repared
for the amount of deaths you will see,” s ays Roberto
Tonelli, a 31-year-old pulmonologist in Modena, Italy.
Back in Florida, Blake is already watching Italy
closely. “ Right n ow, those of us in health care, we all
have pre-traumatic stress disorder,” she says. “We
know what’s coming, a nd we know it’s going to be a
storm.” Blake understands that being in her 60s puts
her a t a n i ncreased risk if she contracts COVID-19,
but she has no plans to take herself off the front lines.
“I went into nursing because I wanted to help
people,” she says. “I’ve got to get in there and use
my personal protective equipment.” Hopefully there
will be enough of it. —With reporting by Francesca
Trianni/OrlandO and Haley s weeTland
e dwards/new yOrk □^
Health care
providers donning
prote ctive gear
re st befo re
administe ring
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