Kerala’s Nipah survivor seeks to join Covid fight

I am keen to work in a Covid hospital. Many prayed for my life [when I was in the hospital] and it is time for me to pay back

When she was 19, M Ajanya, a student of nursing in north Kerala contracted the dreaded Nipah virus, which has a mortality rate of 80%. Ajanya was on a ventilator for a week but didn’t give up; nor did her doctors. She recovered.

Now 21, Ajanya, who graduated this year from the Government Nursing College in Kozhikode with a graduate degree in GNM (general nursing and midwifery), is waiting for a job. “I am keen to work in a Covid hospital,” she says. Her tryst with Nipah, Ajanya says, has only made her love her chosen profession even more.

The daughter of a farm labourer and an anganwadi worker, Ajanya contracted Nipah while interning at the Kozhikode Medical College

Hospital in 2018. “I was in the ICU looking after my patients as part of my training. On May 18, 2018, I developed high fever and other ailments and got admitted at the same ward. Two days later I lost consciousness. I was later told Lini Puthussery was in the same ward,” she said.

Puthussery, also a nurse, succumbed to the virus later. Last year the state government instituted an award in her memory.

“I consider nursing one of the noblest professions . Becoming a nurse was my childhood dream. I have applied to several places (for a job) I am waiting for the call. As a beginner, it is time for me to take challenges head on. I would love to treat Covid patients,” Ajanya says, adding that she is still in touch with some of the nurses and doctors who treated her.