Family urge people to heed public health recommendations

THE family of a 77-year-old Dundalk grandmother who died from COVID-19 are urging people to follow public health guidelines as the highly contagious illness sweeps like wildfire across the country.

Margaret Eaton died after spending over fifty days in Our Lady of Lourdes Hospital and her heartbroken family don’t want any others to have to suffer the same devastation that they have.

Daughter Anne, who also became ill with COVID-19, is urging people to stay at home, and if they test positive for COVID-19 or are a close contact, to isolate.

Now, as the third wave of COVID-19 sweeps across the country with cases soaring in Louth, she is dismayed at the lack of adherence to public health guidelines, by people refusing to wear masks and not social distancing.

‘Mum’s illness, my own COVID-19 experience and her death took up almost two months,’ she explains. ‘ When I returned to ‘ normal life’, I wasn’t liking what I saw.’

‘It was as if people thought COVID-19 had gone away,’ she says, describing how she was taken aback to see people working in shops not wearing masks.

On Christmas Day I went out to the graveyard and saw groups of 15-20 people gathered around graves with little or no distance and very few wearing masks.’

She is also worried by social media comments complaining about the restrictions aimed at curbing the spread of COVID-19 and comments such as ‘It’s only the vulnerable that are dying’ as if they are expendable.

‘Wasn’t there a man with a moustache many years ago who wanted a perfect society and get rid of the vulnerable? Yet these people giving these opinions think they are going to save us by not conforming to a New World Order. I’ve two words for them – dangerous loopers!’

She says that size of COVID-19 clusters being reported now is ‘scary.’

She had isolated immediately after she spend time with her mother when she fell ill.

‘Even before she was confirmed positive and because I made my own choice that day to help her, I isolated immediately. It did not pass on. It ended there. But I’ve been told of clusters of 11 and as high as 34! I can’t see how anyone in those groups are even trying to isolate!’

Asked if she has a message which may help others avoid the heartbreak which has befallen on her family, Anne replies: ‘ The only thing I can say is everyone has to be responsible. If everyone plays their part this will end. We should not be in a third wave and third lockdown. We are here because not everyone did their best. In fact we are here because some people are selfish and don’t care!’

She urges everyone to wear a mask, wash their hands, and to follow social distancing when they have to go out and about.

Anne and her mother had taken every precaution and followed all the public health guidelines since COVID-19 came to our shores last Spring, although sadly it wasn’t enough to stop them getting this highly infectious illness.

‘We are all links in a chain, and one chink in that long chain can extend outside a bubble and beyond, and could kill someone in that chain. It killed my Mum.’

She herself is still suffering from the after affects of COVID-19, including fatigue, muscle pain and coughing.

The family were well aware of the dangers of pandemic due to their own family history.

Anne’s Dad Pat, who worked as a printer in The Dundalk Democrat, had often told her the story of his three aunts, Lily, Mary and Alice, who died during the Spanish Flu.

Sadly this current pandemic has added another sad chapter to the family history.