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No one is safe, says healthy young man hospitalized due to COVID-19 variant

Last Updated Apr 13, 2021 at 5:40 pm MDT

WINNIPEG – A healthy 22-year-old Winnipeg man with no underlying conditions is sharing his experience with the B.1.1.7. COVID-19 variant to give Canadians some perspective.

Peter Soliman found himself in the emergency room at St. Boniface hospital after his dad was identified as a close contact and his parents tested positive.

“I think it’s really important for people to know that these variants are very dangerous.”

Soliman’s oxygen had dropped to 70—so low it could result in severe organ damage.

“In general, like, if I’m in the hospital and that happens, that’s the panic button.”

His parents were in hospital as well.

“I was, the whole time, sitting there going like, ‘I hope that all three of us can make it out of the hospital, because that would kind of just destroy me as a person.’”

On his fifth day here, the virus, which had already rendered him bed-bound on oxygen, started to break him mentally as well.

“I felt completely just helpless, tired, and I was just exhausted. I remember, I was with my mom, we’re a religious family. And I looked, at St. Boniface they have some kind of cross there, and I was just kind of praying to myself and saying to God, ‘I’m drained. I can’t do this. This is very, just too much.’”

He says his doctor was amazing, reaching out to contacts in Europe and reading the new research, but with new viruses come many unknowns.

“There is going to be a lot of, ‘I don’t knows’ and the terms, ‘I hope you that you get better,’ which is sometimes all you have in there, in that room of that COVID-19 unit.”

Slowly, Soliman started to get better. His mom and dad made it through as well, all under the helpful watch of his sister, a nurse who has been vaccinated and remained healthy.

“She saved my life to be honest.”

Soliman is grateful that he and his parents are alive. He is still feeling the draining effects of pneumonia and is hoping to recover without any long-term effects.

He’s sharing his story to help others understand the pandemic is not over.

“I can see a lot of people kind of trying to go back to normal living and getting very comfortable. As much as that’s what we want, we have to look at reality and just be realistic and start to care about one another because I may be recovering, but other people might not get that chance,” he said.

“No one is really safe from this. I feel like there’s a huge misconception that teenagers and people in their 20s and younger, that they’re safe, it’s a free pass. But it really isn’t.”