‘Staying positive helped me beat deadly virus’

LUCKNOW : Positivity helped this civil engineer beat Covid-19. He fought the deadly infection for over 29 days in hospitals in Unnao and Lucknow and came out victorious.

Ajay Gupta, 53, posted at Rural Engineering Department’s Unnao wing, got infected to the coronavirus while performing his duty at migrants’ quarantine centre in Unnao’s Nawabganj.

He was deployed there as in-charge of the centre to take care of facilities being provided to the migrants continuously for around a month.

Gupta, who was discharged from PGI Covid-19 hospital on June 27, is now spending days at home in Lucknow as doctors have suggested him to stay in quarantine for at least 14 days. He, however, is badly missed by his family members, office colleagues and neighbours as he was popular among them as a man who is always ready to help.

“He is known for his soft and calm behaviour as well as positive attitude in life to help others,” said his former colleague, Jai Prakash Singh, who stays in his neighbourhood.

While sharing journey of being testing positive to turning Covid-19 negative, Gupta said he was little reluctant joining duty as in-charge of the quarantine centre believing that he will be exposed to the infection but finally took the charge of the quarantine centre on May 2.

“For around 27 days, I worked continuously taking care of migrants’ workers and feel blessed to get an opportunity to share their pain and give some relief to them while ensuring the best possible facilities available,” he said.

He said he was feeling little exhausted after continuously working for around 19-20 hours a day and felt mild fever on May 29 when he decided to get himself tested.

“My blood pressure and sugar was also found abnormal during medical examination and I was admitted at Unnao district hospital for two days before being tested positive for the infection on June 1. I then was referred to Rajdhani Covid-19 hospital of SGPGI in Lucknow.”

Gupta said his fever remained for over a week that even troubled doctors as well his family members but he was positive enough to recover.

“Since my body temperature became normal on June 7, I felt better and followed the treatment protocol strictly. I used to woke up at around 5 am, drank hot water as many times as I can and took medicines on time,” he stated and added, “But my test reports came positive at least twice on June 13 and 18 keeping people worried about my condition”.

“My family got worried when my test samples taken on June 24 and June 25 tested positive. Finally, the sample taken on June 26 tested out negative,” he said.

Gupta said people should not feel afraid of the infection but should face it bravely. He said he will try to make aware people about the infection.

For around 27 days, I worked continuously taking care of migrants and feel blessed to get an opportunity to share their pain and give them some relief while ensuring best possible facilities available

AJAY GUPTA, Corona Survivor