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Fortunately, he did it and Carlo Giussani, a 35-year radiologist technician at the Cremona hospital, confessed his experience to Tgcom24. "I got sick simultaneously with the patient 1 of Codogno and in those same days in the red zone of the Basso Lodigiano area, Cremona was experiencing a similar situation", he recalls. "I am a survivor, but the reality - he admits - is that it seems to empty the sea with a spoon". And he returns to the days of late January with those too many cases of abnormal pneumonia among young people: "We insiders wondered what was happening".
How are you today, almost a month after that positive buffer?
"I am clearly recovering, still a little weak for the therapies; of course, being in quarantine does not help, but we all are. After 15 days of hospitalization between infectious diseases and pneumatology, I was discharged and I will have to stay at home for another ten days, pending other tests and the last two swabs that must give negative results".
Could being on the other side of the fence for work and finding yourself as a patient have helped you?
"No, because even the technicians have knowledge related only to their specialty and when they are sick they behave like all the sick, they want to know. Then, I was told even less than I wanted, because for everyone I already had to know the situation. However, at a certain point, I must say, I also thought of dying: staying conscious even on the toughest days of forced ventilation does not help. Because you spend time thinking, reflecting even if you breathe and that breath can be the last".
In Cremona, where the health situation is still dramatic today, he was among the first to fall ill, simultaneously with Codogno's patient 1. Do you know how he could have been infected?
"I couldn't even tell the ASL, nor was it easy for me to trace all my contacts: in Radiology we are an army of 60-70 employees, plus I move to the departments to make plates. I realized that I had flu symptoms and it was strange because I had the vaccine. They subjected me to a tampon because I had been in contact with a pneumatology cancer patient who died with coronavirus. But I do not connect my infection to him; I have never had respiratory problems or suffer from other pathologies. At a certain point, I thought it was my partner who got sick first. I don't really know, also because in my ward, however, I was the only positive in those days and, afterward, the epidemic didn't happen because we were immediately put under control."
Its influence, however, seemed strange. Other signs?
"Already at the end of January, we had noticed atypical pneumonia in young people subjected to slabs. I have been working in radiology for 35 years and we did not remember such a concentration. It was unusual in unsuspected times and the hospital moved in time reorganizing spaces and workforce" .
What weighed most on you?
"In those 15 days of hospitalization, you were immediately on your own and in the 4-5 centers where I felt bad I would have liked to shake the hand of those I love. In pneumatology, then, I had a roommate but we were both with the mask of the forced breathing, so in the end we only said goodbye. I thought a lot, in those days; it is distressing to hear only your own breath, the machines in action ... I keep having information from my colleagues and I am convinced that the virus does not look really anyone in the face. "
What do you wish now?
"That the vaccine is found. At this hour we must think. In my isolation I personally was able to appreciate what I had of life; I started reading books again, listening to the radio. Do not complain about staying at home, enjoy it before you start again, make hamsters. We stay at home to save ourselves: what is happening in Bergamo is also happening in Cremona and can happen anywhere".