Tag: Washington Post

From the Washington Post on June 21, 2020, as told to Eli Saslow.

Nobody wants to know about what I do. People might pay us lip service and say we’re heroes, but our stories aren’t the kind anyone actually wants to hear about. Kids in this country grow up with toy firetrucks, or maybe playing cops and robbers, but who dreams of becoming a paramedic? That’s ambulances. That’s death and vulnerability — the scary stuff. We’re taught in this culture to shun illness like it’s something shameful. We’d rather pretend everything’s fine. We look the other way.

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New York EMS Captain Hugo Sosa survived the ICU. But for coronavirus patients like him, that’s just the start of recovery.

Hugo Sosa arrived here a hero, triumphant over the worst that covid-19 can inflict on the human body. Nearly 100 of his fellow first responders whooped and cheered as Sosa was wheeled out of a hospital last month. They chanted his name. He flashed them a thumbs-up from his gurney.

Twelve days later, frail and drawn in his room at Burke Rehabilitation Hospital, Sosa puzzled over a pile of coins his speech pathologist had set before him.

“Forty-five cents from a dollar, what do you get back?” Kristen Lucke asked.

“Fifty-five cents,” Sosa responded quickly.

“Good, show me 55 cents.”

That was more difficult. Sosa would have to hold the number in his head while he searched for the right coins. Today that was too much to ask. Perhaps tomorrow.

Read Hugo’s story by Lenny Bernstein in the Washington Post►