ELMWOOD PARK, N.J. – It took only a single act of generosity to undo months of Sofia Burke’s caution on the job.
Sofia is a nurse. She took care of COVID-19 patients through the pandemic’s first wave in New Jersey. She inserted intravenous lines, pushed fluids, held some patients as they died and helped others to survive at the nursing home where she works.
Above all, she followed safety protocols – neither she nor any member of her family became sick.
But in November, COVID-19 spread into the Elmwood Park, New Jersey, home that Sofia shares with seven other family members. After Sofia’s mother gave a car ride to an elderly friend with a cough, she became infected. And from her, the infection spread.
By Thanksgiving, all eight members of Sofia’s household had become sick, all but the last testing positive for the coronavirus.
Her father died of the virus. Her mother, discharged after six days, still needs supplemental oxygen for the slightest exertion. Every other member of the family – Sofia’s brother, her husband, and her three children, ages 2, 6 and 20 – is recovering from or coping with the aftereffects of COVID-19.
And Sofia herself, who had been so careful for so long on the job, remains in the hospital with the virus.