‘COVID took my mom’

Twenty-five-year-old Tashi Belle shared an unbreakable bond with her mother, Lorna Bailey. However, COVID-19 took away her 62-year-old mother seven months ago.

Bailey was living in Florida, United States, for seven years after migrating form Spanish Town in St Catherine. She died three weeks after testing positive for the virus. More than 2.7 million people have died from the illness worldwide, 507 of them in Jamaica up to Tuesday.

"My mom was on the ventilator for three weeks. She couldn't talk so the only thing was for the doctor to call us and we say a few words to her," Belle told THE STAR.

Given the manner in which COVID-19 is transmitted, infected persons are kept in quarantine or isolation, often cut off from loved ones and thus denied the opportunity for hugs and comfort. Belle could only speak to her mother via video calls.

"On the video calls my mom looked like when someone got shot. Her colour changed, she was so dark and she was a very brown lady," Belle said.

She believes that her mother contracted the disease from a relative who showed no symptoms of it. Her mom, she said, thought she had picked up a cold.

"As the days went by, though, she got so ill and she was was rushed to the hospital," Belle said. "I wasn't expecting anything like that to reach my family, especially my mom, because she is always inside. She had been strong and healthy all these years, and then within a few weeks she was gone." Bailey had three daughters and a son. They have been struggling to cope.

"When I do have time, I go to her graveside and take her favourite drink along with roses and talk to her like we normally would, if she was here," Belle said between tears. "I watch her videos at night, read her text messages and listen to her voice notes because it makes me feel so much better." Having lost her mom to the virus, Belle said that she takes no chances.

"I wear two masks these days and make sure I isolate myself as much as possible because this thing is real. People will not understand it until they are in the position, and trust me, it's not easy. Loved ones are being lost and this thing is not a joke," she said.