How the coronavirus ravaged a Cincinnati family

Chris Hahn could tell right away something wasn’t right about his brother that morning.

At 6-foot-4, Gary Hahn was a bear of a man with a handshake like a vice grip. But on this day, March 16, he moved uneasily around the metal shop where they worked, as if every step caused him pain.

When Chris asked if he was OK, Gary shook his head.

“I feel like crap,” he said. Gary went home early that day and never came back. No one knew it at the time, but the novel coronavirus already was doing its deadly work on the Hahn family.

Gary was the first. But in less than two weeks, four family members and two others with ties to them would fall ill. The virus was as merciless as it was swift, spreading from brother to brother, father to son, son to mother, wife to husband.

“It’s just a vicious cycle,” Chris said. “It never stops.”

Gary, 65, who also suffered from liver problems, went to the emergency room at Mercy West Hospital days after he showed up sick to work. He was on a ventilator in the intensive care unit soon after.

His brother, Chris, 63, started feeling sick on March 19, a few days after Gary. Sore throat. Dry cough. His chest hurt. His back hurt. Everything hurt. He figured he’d caught whatever Gary had. And while he didn’t know for sure what it was, he’d seen enough on the news to know what it could be.

Chris called his doctor, who sent him to the drivethru testing station closest to his Green Township home to get checked for coronavirus.

He wouldn’t get the results for another week, but any doubt was gone a few days later, when younger brother, Scott, 62, got sick, too. His symptoms were the same. Suddenly, the global pandemic had become more than an inconvenience, or an abstraction.

Chris couldn’t be sure how they got it. They all worked together in the same shop. They all spent time together outside of work, riding Harleys or hanging out. They were as close as brothers could be.

Now, they were all sick and getting sicker.

By March 29, Chris’s wife, Cindy, had seen enough. His fever was rising and his heart rate was up. “You’re sick,” she told him. “You’ve got the virus.” Then she drove him to Good Samaritan Hospital in University Heights, where he was admitted.

Around the same time, Scott went to Mercy West and was put in a room not far from his brother, Gary. Soon, both were placed on ventilators to help them breathe.

Chris’s breathing was labored, but he wasn’t as bad off as his brothers. His fever, though, hit 103 and he was about as miserable as he’d ever been.

The day after he was admitted, Chris said, a doctor came into his room and told him he’d got the results from his drive-thru test the week before.

“Mr. Hahn,” he said, “you tested positive for COVID-19.”

“I don’t doubt that,” Chris said.