LOCAL ACTIVIST HAS BOUT WITH COVID-19
Former candidate for mayor had difficulty breathing at hospital
Tasha Williamson, a community activist and former candidate for San Diego mayor, is slowly recovering at home from a significant case of COVID-19 that required several days of hospitalization just after Christmas.
Williamson, 48, said Monday by phone that she is continuing to take blood thinners, antibiotics and special vitamins to help with her recovery. The blood thinners were prescribed to prevent clotting associated with the disease, she said.
While hospitalized at Sharp Chula Vista Medical Center, she was on oxygen and was given the antiviral drug remdesivir, but Williamson said she was able to avoid being placed on a ventilator.
Her toughest day in the hospital was Dec. 28, near the middle of her stay, when she could barely move and breathing was quite difficult.
“They shifted me on to my stomach so I could breathe,” she said. “It was really painful. Having difficulty breathing is the worst feeling ever.”
After that scare, Williamson said she started to slowly recover and was able to return home in time for New Year’s Eve, which she mostly slept through.
She said she still often feels groggy and weak since returning home.
Williamson said she doesn’t have any severe underlying conditions that would exacerbate her symptoms, but she said doctors told her she is obese and suffers from pre-diabetes and pre-hypertension.
She first felt sick a few days before Christmas, suffering from what she described as a head cold with some chest pressure. She started struggling to breathe on Dec. 23 and her 10-year-old son, Caleb, was feeling extremely tired, so they went to the emergency room at Sharp Coronado Hospital.
Williamson was given a COVID-19 test and sent home with medicine, but she said the hospital declined her request that they test her son. She said hospital staff told her they would test him if her test eventually came back positive.
After she was notified that she had tested positive, she went to the Chula Vista hospital and was admitted. Her son has not shown symptoms, for which Williamson said she is extremely thankful.
Williamson said she was especially grateful to the nurses who treated her while she was hospitalized. She said they “saved her life,” noting that doctors only talked to her over a phone line.
She said she empathizes with people who have lost their businesses and their livelihoods during the pandemic, but public health needs to be the top priority.
Williamson, a Democrat, first emerged on the local political scene as a vocal critic of law enforcement, particularly their treatment of minorities and the poor.
She finished fourth in the March 2020 primary for San Diego mayor, a post that was eventually won by Todd Gloria in the November runoff.