The family of a Florida woman who was tested for coronavirus on March 13 after contracting pneumonia in both lungs has revealed that she is still waiting for results 12 days after she first entered an intensive care unit.
Vickie Schafer, 61, is in a medically induced coma in Palm West hospital but staff are left unsure of how to treat her because they are still waiting to confirm whether she has coronavirus or not.
Frustrated healthcare workers even conducted a second test hoping that results from either one would soon be delivered.
The delay comes as coronavirus testing in Palm Beach County, home to President Trump’s winter home Mar-a-Lago, is heavily criticized by residents as they lose out on pay and are fearful to leave their homes all because they cannot confirm their results.
Vickie Schafer, 61, is lying in a medically induced coma in Palms West hospital in Florida
Her family is concerned that Schafer, pictured left, has been awaiting her coronavirus test results for 12 days and may now be awoken from her coma to find herself alone
Not only can staff in Palm West hospital not treat Schafer but the delay means they are forced to continue wearing increased protection to ensure they do not pick up coronavirus from her, potentially needlessly taking up the limited supply if it turns out that Schafer developed pneumonia for some other reason.
And Schafer’s sister who sat by her side when she was first admitted to hospital and who is now shiwing symptoms can now not get a test in a county which is significantly behind in testing for potential cases.
On Thursday, Palm Beach County Mayor Dave Kerner confirmed that the federal government won’t establish a drive-though coronavirus testing site in the area.
Schafer first fell ill on March 11 with what she thought was the flu.
She was given antibiotics for a bronchial infection and returned to her work as a bookkeeper.
She landed in the emergency room two days later where it was discovered that one part of her lungs was infected.
By March 15, both her lungs had submitted to the infection and she was put on a ventilator and placed in isolation where her family was not sure she was going to make it.
Twelves days later and she is still awaiting the results, as staff question whether to take her out of the coma so they can use her respirator elsewhere.
Palms West Hospital where staff are treating Schafer and considering waking her from a coma
Her daughter-in-law Crystal Lucas told the Palm Beach Post that the family is now worried about what will happen if they can’t be by her side when she is woken up.
‘What everybody is most upset about when she comes out of sedation, having been in a coma for two weeks, nobody will be there to hold her hand and tell her it’s going to be OK,’ said Lucas, who lives in Oregon.
‘She is going to wake up to a nurse who looks like they’re out of a pandemic movie and how traumatic that is going to be.
‘My husband wanted to fly there and can’t. The hospital is completely shut down to visitors,’ Lucas continued.
‘When Vickie was really touch and go in that first 24 hours and we thought she literally wouldn’t make it, that was when my husband was most torn up.
‘We still have no results from that test,’ Lucas added while praising the staff working with her.
‘We were told two days, then we were told seven to 10 days and now we are on day 12.
‘I just want to tell people to not take shelter in place orders lightly. I think Vickie is solely alive because she was lucky enough to be on the front end of it. In two weeks, I don’t know.’
People are still heading to beach in Palm Springs despite the growing coronavirus cases
Patrons dine at Avocado Grill on Datura Street in West Palm Beach Florida, where residents have hit out at the lack of coronavirus testing available as they struggle with symptoms
One of Palm Beach’s popular restaurants, Buccan, voluntarily closed as the coronavirus hits
The lag in results also means that those who spent time closest to Schafer before her hospitalization are being left in limbo over their own best course of action.
As well as her co-workers who she spent those two days with her before hospitalization, her sister Gina Shelton is now ill at home and unable to get a test.
‘It’s extremely scary,’ Shelton said.
‘Especially not having the results of the test back. It’s unbelievable. And not being able to go to the hospital to see her makes me feel extremely helpless.’
Schafer is far from the only case displaying both the lack of testing and test delays in Palm Beach County, which residents have slammed for inefficiency in protecting their health.
The Lane family in Boynton Beach may have been exposed to the high profile case of a man who flew back to Florida from New York and then tested positive.
The family attends Chabad-Lubavitch of Greater Boynton with the patient and father Marc Lane later came down with a cough and chills.
The family’s doctor has said he will test them in the driveway of their home but he is not even able to find the tests to do so.
The family’s 20-year-old son is among the vulnerable population leaving them feeling ‘thrown under the bus in all this’.
Healthcare workers screen patients who will be tested for COVID-19 at the FoundCare drive-thru testing station in Palm Springs. Palm Beach County will not have a similar testing center
A test being conducted at the first and only drive-thru coronavirus testing station in Palm Springs. The federal government said they will not set one up in Palm Beach County
Wife Alexa is also now without pay as the lack of testing has meant she can not return to her job as a medical assistant at a private health care clinic without knowing whether or not she has been exposed.
‘We are not independently wealthy or retired,’ Lane said.
‘We are both working trying to make it month-to-month raising kids. Having to miss two weeks of pay because we couldn’t get tested to find out if it is safe to go back to work without risking exposing people, it’s indescribable.’
In yet another case of test failure in the county, Wellington Realtor Ashley Ouellette has experienced a fever and has had to cancel meetings, worried that she could expose an 82-year-old grandmother, her 69-year-old husband, who has Parkinson’s, and her 89-year-old father, who is visiting.
The 55-year-old was told she cannot get a test as her temperature was not high enough.
‘I’m the person who cares for everyone,’ she said.
‘I just want to know I don’t have it and be able to take care of these guys and keep it out of here.’
Of the seven largest counties in Florida, Palm Beach County lags way behind in testing, according to the Palm Beach Post as the state quickly becomes a hot spot for the coronavirus in the U.S.
Palm Beach has currently only tested only 81 people per 100,000 leaving it dead last in the ranking of the state’s seven largest metropolitan areas.
That means that only 1,166 people out of the population of 1.4 million have been tested.
141 people have been found positive.
‘Each day that passes is one that the virus is circulating, and we don’t know how bad it is in Palm Beach County,’ County Commissioner Mack Bernard said.
‘I’m flabbergasted and baffled by the lack of testing in Palm Beach County.’
On a national scale, about 100 people per every million have so far been tested in the United States.
In Florida, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services worked with the state to do mass testing under the CDC guidelines in Duval, Orange and Miami-Dade counties, picked because of their geographical size and because of the large venues they hold where tens of thousands of people could gather in none place.
Focus was also given to Miami, Fort Lauderdale and Orlando because they are hubs of international travel, while Palm Beach is not.
More than 92,000 people have tested positive for the coronavirus in the US and at least 1,390 are known to have died from the infection.
Florida has been deemed a coronavirus hot spot in the U.S. with 2,484 cases and 29 deaths.