Ask HN: What would you do if you got Covid?

In the recent past, we were grieving the sudden passing of my father who collapsed unconscious as soon as he got off a motorcycle on which he was a pillion rider. We rushed him to the hospital where he was pronounced dead upon arrival. He had had no significant medical problems to speak of. They couldn't determine the cause of death as the facility was understaffed and overrun with patients battling the Covid-19 pandemic or other infectious diseases. We had to get out of there in no time.

A week after my father's untimely demise, my mother suffered a massive stroke and went into a coma. We brought her home after the doctors treating her at the hospital had declared her brain dead. During the hospitalization, she was diagnosed with Covid-19, which we were told caused her the ischemic stroke.

Of note, we live in a village where we have no access to healthcare at all.

As her caregivers at home, my wife (42) and I (48) were exposed to my mother while she was still comatose and recovering from the infectious disease, and subsequently both my wife and I tested positive for the coronavirus. With no one else around to help us except my daughter who we had kept in isolation, we continued caring for my mother, giving her nothing but thin liquids via a feeding tube.

The symptoms my wife and I experienced through our recovery lasting a week to 10 days included a low-grade fever, loss of taste and smell. It took us about a month to regain the latter. Even my mother, who is 68 and otherwise healthy, regained consciousness and her ability to communicate over a month or so and she began taking in food orally after I had no choice but to go ahead and remove her feeding tube myself. She is still paralyzed and bedridden, though.

1. Seek out reliable expert opinion, rather than asking Internet randoms for advice.

"What to Do If You Are Sick"

- Keep track of your symptoms.

- Stay home except to get medical care

- Separate yourself from other people

(Additional detail at link.)

https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/if-you-are-sick/st...

"You Tested Positive for Covid. Now What?"

If you’re in public or around people when you get the bad news, put on a mask immediately. Then isolate yourself as quickly as possible, even if you don’t have symptoms. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommends isolating for five days if you are asymptomatic or if you do not have a fever and your other symptoms are improving, followed by five days of wearing a mask when you are around people. The C.D.C. previously recommended isolating for 10 days. If you have a fever, the agency advises you to stay home until the fever resolves.

https://www.nytimes.com/article/testing-positive-covid-omicr...

First thing I would do is grab the camping gear and setup in my garage to isolate myself. I have a daughter with chronic illness issues and although we are all vaccinated, she is most likely to be seriously effected out of any of us. (Knowing that by the time I knew I had COVID, it would probably be too late, it would be worth trying at least.)

I just had it. If it wasn't for all the tests I did, I wouldn't have known I had anything. I passed it on to my 72 yo father and his partner (both unvaccinated) and they were sick - somewhere between a severe cold and a mild flu.

I wouldn't advise anyone to be flippant about it, but the odds are you'll be fine, so don't panic.

If I could do anything differently, it would be to have a better plan in place for isolation. I was visiting my home country at the time and didn't have a place of my own to isolate. That was careless on my part.

Sit at home, take some painkillers for fever and get over it? That’s exactly what I have done, having had COVID for the last week. It’s been nothing worse than a cold, but YMMV.

I'm vaccinated and boosted, so I assume it wouldn't be much worse than a cold. But if it were I'd be happy I live in the most vaccinated county in the USA and there is still enough room at my local hospital to go the ER/ICU. I assume they'd know what to do from there.

I'm more worried about my four year old, who can't get vaccinated. If he got it I would hope it is minor, but if not, I'd go straight to the local hospital.

Isolate, manage symptoms while in touch with my medical professionals. Additionally, avoid pushing the body. Take it easy. Covid can escalate with aggression in some people, and one doesn't know, until it has happened.

Stay in bed for a couple days, eat chicken noodle soup, watch cartoons.

Worked in Feb 2020 and the first week of this month, when it ripped through our family. Teen daughter came down with mild symptoms first in both cases.