Harold Smith, a 57-year-old Region Seven resident who is among the latest group of persons confirmed to have died due to COVID-19, was sick for two weeks with a mild fever before he suddenly began experiencing severe symptoms of the disease, according to his family, who were surprised at his sudden passing.
Smith, who died on October 1st, just as he was about to be transported to the Georgetown Public Hospital (GPH), was buried on Friday. On the same day, the Health Ministry confirmed four more deaths, including that of the 57-year-old from Region Seven, although he was not named.
According to his sister, Zorena Smith, at the time of his death they were yet to know the status of his COVID-19 test results but upon his admission to the Bartica Regional Hospital they were told that he was being taken to a section of the hospital reserved for COVID-19 patients due to the symptoms he was displaying.
Harold was a resident of Batavia, one of the communities in Region Seven, which has at one time been a COVID-19 hot spot.
In an interview with Sunday Stabroek yesterday, Zorena disclosed that her brother got sick more than two weeks before he died. Throughout the two weeks, she said, her brother did not suffer from the usual symptoms commonly associated with COVID-19 and only had a mild fever and a consistent stomach ache so nothing was thought of his illness because he still continued to eat like he did before.
On the Friday before he died, Zorena recalled, she was in Georgetown and she decided to call him to find out how he was doing and he told her that he was ok and the fever seemed to be easing up. The following day, however, Harold’s condition worsened and she travelled back to the community to take care of him.
On September 27th, she recounted, they decided to take Harold to a private doctor in Bartica, where he was tested for typhoid and also COVID-19 but was told that he was not infected with either of the two diseases but they would give him saline to make him feel better.
After he was discharged, Zorena said, they took him back to his home in Batavia and Smith told her that he was feeling better. On the following day, he told her that he felt like his heart was beating very fast and swelling. However, he soon felt better and went to visit one of his nieces in the community and it was then that he began experiencing shortness of breath. He continued to experience shortness of breath throughout the night and on the following day, September 29th, his family took him to the Bartica Regional Hospital.
Due to the symptoms he was displaying, Zorena said, Harold was taken to the COVID-19 ward, where samples were collected from him for testing. She said they were told that it would be a while for his results to return but it was very likely that he had COVID-19.
On October 1st, she said, they received a call from the hospital telling them that family member is needed at the hospital as they would be transferring Harold to the GPH. She said she told a relative to go to the hospital while she made preparations to travel to the city to take care of her brother.
Zorena stated that the relative did as he was told and when he arrived at the hospital he found Harold already in an ambulance. She added that the relative later went into the ambulance to see how Harold was doing and discovered that he had died.
She added that despite his age, his death was a total surprise for many of them because throughout his lifetime, Harold had never gotten seriously ill. “My brother never sick and this was the only time he got sick… So I don’t know if the fever or whatsoever make he got weak but it was sudden,” she said.
Further, Zorena added that up to the time before he fell sick, Harold was very healthy and vibrant and still did his farming. Since the pandemic began, he never travelled and only visited his relatives and his farm so she wasn’t sure how he may have contracted the virus.
When asked if anyone in their family tested positive for COVID-19, she said that her daughter and her son-in-law did but they didn’t suffer from any symptoms of the disease and during the time they were infected they isolated themselves and took all the precautions so that others wouldn’t get infected.
Harold Smith is the second person from Batavia to succumb to COVID-19.
