Pennsylvania doctors reflect on COVID-19 pandemic 5 years later
Tuesday, March 11, marks five years since the World Health Organization declared the COVID-19 pandemic. It was the beginning of a wave of illnesses that took millions of lives worldwide.
Hospitals were the front lines in a global battle to treat a then-mysterious virus.
"As of this afternoon, we have a total of 16 Pennsylvania cases of COVID-19," Pennsylvania Health Secretary Dr. Rachel Levine said.
Five years ago, Levine was updating early COVID numbers that would quickly escalate.
Dr. Raina Merchant was working in the emergency department at Penn Medicine as COVID swept through the Philadelphia region.
Penn Medicine treated thousands of patients – many of the most critically ill.
"We had to be really nimble to respond to so many changes in information and how we could optimize care for patients," Merchant said.
In New York City, the epicenter of the pandemic, Sal Mazzara, who had an early and serious case of COVID-19, was reunited with the doctor who saved his life.
"I could not believe what was going on. That I was just dropping my husband off at the hospital and wasn't sure we gonna see him again," Josephine Mazzara, Sal's wife, said.
Mount Sinai Hospital quickly filled. Tents were set up in Central Park for overflow patients, and refrigerated trucks were used to hold bodies.
"I've never seen so much tragedy in a short period of time," Dr. Sanam Ahmed, a critical care physician at Mount Sinai Health System, said.
Sal Mazzara spent weeks on a ventilator and suffered a cardiac arrest.
"In COVID, if you had a cardiac arrest, it was extremely unlikely that you would survive and Sal did," Ahmed said.
After 45 days, Sal Mazzara left the hospital to go home.
"I hope that people remember how everyone supported each other," Ahmed said.
About 1.22 million people died of COVID in the U.S., according to data from the CDC.
Doctors say the vaccine, which was created in Philadelphia at Penn Medicine, substantially changed the course of the pandemic.