Daily Mirror (Northern Ireland)
I drea it comin back. I broken the end person don’t th I can do this aga We have a clear plan & we want to keep doing right things but our batteries are low
DR ROBERTO COSENTINI Head of Emergency Dept at Papa Giovanni XXIII Hospital, Bergamo, Italy
They are 600 miles apart, separated by France and Switzerland as the crow flies, and born 30 years apart, but Dr Shaan Sahota in London and Dr Roberto Cosentini in Bergamo, Italy, speak as one about the harrowing first wave of the coronavirus.
On a video call, they reveal the trauma they both went through, Dr Sahota, 30, as a junior doctor at Northwick Park Hospital in Harrow, North West London, and Dr Cosentini, 61, as head of the Emergency Department at the Papa Giovanni XXIII Hospital in Bergamo.
Dr Cosentini says: “At the end of February, our city became one of the worst hit by the Covid pandemic in Italy.
“By the first two weeks of March, we had the worst-case scenario in the world. It was like an apocalypse. Ventilated patients reached almost 300.
“It was like an earthquake where after the event you see many patients hurt. Except that every day you see more patients than the day before.”
Dr Sahota’s hospital became the hardest hit in the UK weeks later.
She says: “We were very badly affected too, having to transfer patients to different ICUS because we were so full.
“I found ICU so stressful, patients on ventilator, the alarms going of f. It was very upsetting. I only qualified a year and a half ago.”
We asked the two medics to meet via a video call to pioneer our new project Europe Talks – a version of our groundbreaking Britain Talks series. As Britain approaches the final stage of Brexit, the
Mirror has teamed up with newspapers and websites in Italy, Germany, France, Poland and 10 other European countries to pair people for a chat across borders.
Using a system developed by Zeit Online in Germany, our readers will be matched to someone in another country to talk about how their lives have been affected by the coronavirus, and to see if they can find “more in common”. The sign-up for Europe Talks, which will take place on December 13, starts today.
For our two doctors, the conversation leads to some deeply personal reflections on fear, professionalism and family.
Both shielded their families from the virus. Dr Cosentini says: “It was hard. I didn’t meet my sons in person for three months. They are 24 and 25 and live with their mother, and we had a chat every night when I got home late. We were a strong family, that helped me cope with the struggle of the unknown and with looking after very sick people.”
Dr Sahota says: “I wasn’t afraid for myself, but at the b eginning I was staying with my parents. I knew they wouldn’t necessarily be considered fit for a ventilator in my hospital, so I was very afraid of infecting them.
“I moved out because I worried I could pick the disease up at work. I felt contaminated, this psychology of feeling dirty.” Both doctors had worked in surgery changing to Intensive Care Units when the Covid-19 pandemic hit.
They both talk about the solidarity they felt with colleagues. Dr Cosentini says: “Every one of us worked double shifts, even though nobody asked us to do this. We always thanked each other for our work. This helped us very much, as we felt a very strong group. If the group is strong it is difficult to be overwhelmed completely.”
Dr Sahota says: “There were one or two doctors who would just say thank you to everyone i n the hospital – doctors, cleaners, kitchen staff. It’s such
mall thing to do, but can really transm morale. It was strangely emotional. uld get a weird urge to blurt out ‘I you’ at the end of professional phone . Emotions were running high. s it went on for longer and longer, rota became crazy. All the shifts were t shifts, all 12 hours. We were always d, lonely and always isolated, and it ame a very intense bonding experi
ence. Everyone was trying to prop each other up. That was the best part.”
Dr C o sentini say s h e and hi s colleagues made a conscious effort to warn Britain and other countries about what was coming because he knew Italians had not “believed enough” in what was happening to China before them.
Even so, Dr Sahota tells him : “I remember at the end of February, when we were a month behind you, I was still going to crowded house parties and even joking about coronavirus.
“One of the big things it has taught me is that until something really is right in front of you, you don’t see it.”
She and her team had other reasons to be grateful to their Italian colleagues. She says: “Around the end of March, we were shown all these videos of ICUS in
Italy. It showed us the techniques that really worked.”
But while PPE shortages endangered staff in the UK, in Bergamo, Dr Cosentini’s hospital never ran out, keeping infections among medical staff down.
He says: “I was afraid in the first few days, when I realised I ’d had close contact with the first two patients.
“I don’t know if we just got used to fear, but also because we never ran out of PPE and we always had the right equipment, we had very low rates of infection. Most colleagues who did contract Covid caught it in the community.”
Now, still traumatised from the first wave, both doctors must prepare to confront the second. Dr Cosentini says: “It is mounting in Milan, where I live. We are worried because we already had this tough experience. We are more prepared, we have a clear plan, what we did during the first wave was right and we want to do it again. But our resistance, our strength, our batteries are not full now.”
Dr Sahota says: “I have this dread. I hope it doesn’t come back. I personally don’t think I can do this again. I felt broken at the end. But you don’t get to choose when you are ready for the second wave.”
Dr Cosentini contrasts the way different countries have approached the virus politically with the way doctors have worked in solidarity across borders.
He says: “This was a worldwide pandemic. We exchanged information, news and ideas amongst the emergency doctors all across the world. I felt not only Italian, but a citizen of the world.”