Doctor forced to refuse COVID patients who beg for vaccine

Young unvaccinated patients beg for the COVID-19 vaccine as they fight for their lives in an Alabama hospital.

Rather, Dr. Brytney Cobia must deliver a heartbreaking dose of reality.

“One of the last things they do before they are intubated is begging me for the vaccine. I hold their hand and tell them I’m sorry, but it’s too late, ”wrote Cobia, who works at Birmingham’s Grandview Medical Center, in a Facebook post Sunday.

Cobia said she was forced to turn down desperate appeals from coronavirus patients about to be placed on ventilators.

“I admit healthy young people with very serious COVID infections to the hospital,” she wrote.

The doctor’s account caught the attention of skeptics, who pointed out online that the death toll in the state was much lower last spring.

Author Jeffrey A. Tucker described Cobia’s post as “just too perfectly crafted one way or another. It tells a story that fits a dominant narrative in every way, but leaves out all the details about the age and health of the serious effects. And it ends up predicting an “imminent fate” for maskless children in school. “

While Alabama has the lowest percentage of fully vaccinated people in the country – just 33.7% of the state’s population – the seven-day average of coronavirus deaths stood at eight on Tuesday, well below the peak of 154 deaths which was reached at the end of January.

The majority of infected patients currently in hospital have not received the vaccine – and the only patient who was vaccinated only needed some oxygen and is expected to recover, Cobia told AL.com.

But some of the patients who weren’t vaccinated weren’t so lucky, she said.

“When I call the time of death, I give my family a hug and tell them that the best way to honor their loved one is to go get the shot and cheer everyone on. they know how to do the same, ”she wrote on Facebook.

“They cry. And they tell me they didn’t know. They thought it was a hoax. They thought it was political. They thought because they had a certain blood type or a certain skin color. , they wouldn’t get that sick. They thought it was “just the flu.” But they were wrong. And they wish they could go back. But they can’t.

Cobia said she recommends anyone who has not been vaccinated to contact their doctor with questions.

“I try not to be judgmental when I get a new COVID patient who is not vaccinated, but I really just started asking them, ‘Why didn’t you get the vaccine? “And I’m just going to ask the question blank, in the least critical way possible,” she said. “And most of them, they’re very honest, they give me answers. “I talked to this person, I saw this thing on Facebook, I got this email, I saw this on the news”, you know, those are all the reasons I didn’t not vaccinated.

“And the only question I always ask them is, have you made an appointment with your GP and asked for their advice on whether or not you should get the vaccine?” And so far, no one has answered yes to this question, ”she continued.

Across the country, at least 99% of deaths from COVID-19 and 97% of hospitalizations are in people who have not been vaccinated, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.