To Those On Front Line!

Charter’97 congratulates Belarusian nurses and medical staff on their holiday.

In the context of the epidemic and daily reports of new infections and deaths, you may not remember many dates, but be sure to pay attention to the International Nurses Day in the calendar. It is marked today, on May 12. The date was chosen in honor of the birthday of heroic English nurse Florence Nightingale, who saved people during the Crimean War in the 19th century.

Today we have our own war, and our heroic paramedics. Thousands of doctors, nurses, paramedics and attendants endanger their lives by saving and helping us, our parents, friends and colleagues.

It seems that nurses and attendants are always in the background, in the shadows. But this is a misleading impression. It is they who spend most of the time with patients - they give injections, bring pills, measure the temperature, constantly check their well-being, wash, change clothes, take out urinals...

During the epidemic, nurses and attendants got to the forefront, and were among the first to die.

We do not know the exact number of health workers infected and deceased in Belarus, but it can be argued that there are thousands of them today. The Ministry of Health called the number 419 on April 17, and has been cowardly silent ever since. The number of people infected with the coronavirus in Belarus is growing exponentially, and probably today it has already reached hundreds of thousands.

We do not know all the names of the dead, because the authorities hide this information, intimidating the relatives and colleagues of the dead. Still, some names and stories of Belarusian nurses have become known, and I want to recall them.

Sviatlana Kisialyova was only 47 years old, she worked as a nurse at the Vitsebsk City Clinical Hospital #1. The hospital has been redesigned since mid-March to receive patients with acute respiratory viral infections. At that time, doctors were not given protective means. Only 15 grams of alcohol per day for hand disinfection. She died on April 3.

Natallia Shmatko was 56 years old, she worked as a nurse at the Minsk ambulance for 38 years. After her last shift on April 10, she began to cough, the temperature rose, and the coronavirus was detected. The woman died on April 20, and was buried in a closed coffin.

41-year-old Nadzeya Famina worked as a nurse at the Vitsebsk Regional Clinical Hospital. The woman got infected with the coronavirus at work, she died on April 16.

45-year-old Halina Navichkova, an ambulance nurse, became the first healthcare provider to die of the coronavirus in Buda-Kashaliova. Her colleagues believe that she picked up the infection in the hospital. The woman died on April 20.

Aksana Radkevich, 45, a nurse from Dokshytsy, worked at one of the epicenters of the coronavirus in Belarus. In the town of Dokshytsy with 7 thousand inhabitants, the entire hospital was redesigned to receive patients with pneumonia and coronavirus. She died on April 21.

Please note that most of the nurses whose names are known died after April 17 - when the Ministry of Health gave the latest statistics on infected health workers.

How many names have remained unknown? How many were buried in closed coffins or burned in crematoria?

Hiding statistics, the authorities simultaneously continue creating all conditions so that the number of deaths grows: they find money on parades, palaces, residences, maybachs and planes, but not on people and hospitals. Here's what doctors say about their work at the time of an epidemic:

“They gave overalls of size 56, but I need 7-8 orders of magnitude less. Respirators are impossible to get. As far as we know, there are respirators but they don’t give them out. We buy glasses ourselves, those designed for builders. Shoe covers, too. And the sleeves, for example, were made for me by my mother,” says a nurse at the Luninets district hospital.

“In the hospital, people die every day of the coronavirus - 15-17 people in average. Doctors work hard, nurses cry at night. I heard a conversation that if in the near future the increase of the number of patients continues, then patients with the coronavirus will be sorted into those who are younger and thus can be saved, and those who are doomed. There will not be enough lungs ventilation devices for everyone,” writes a doctor from Svetlahorsk.

“Yesterday my doctor, three nurses and one attendant fell ill with the coronavirus. Everyone understands that this is COVID-19. The nurses have received payrolls today - they are sitting there crying, as they spend days at work, running around in protective suits, give us injections, droppers, but they haven’t been paid a dime,” says a patient of the Niasvizh Central District Hospital.

“I work as a nurse in the Minsk Regional Tuberculosis Dispensary. We have a lot of patients with COVID-19, who lie next to the “clean” patients. On Saturday, a nurse from my department was hospitalized in the Salihorsk Central District Hospital. She had a fever of about 40 since Friday. Today at 12.30 the nurse died. Smears for COVID-19 were taken on Saturday upon admission, and there have been no results (it seems unlikely they will state coronavirus in the death certificate, even if the results come back positive). She was 45. This is just horrible.I really want people to know and realize what really is going on, and how a person can literally burn to death in a couple of days due to the negligence of the state leadership. Everyone appreciates only doctors, no one thinks of nurses and attendants,” says the letter of a Belarusian nurse who works with patients infected with the coronavirus.

We remember and will surely find out the names of all who sacrificed their lives in the name of saving the lives of others. And the “memory lists” will be complete, not a single name will be forgotten.

In the meantime, I would like to ask you to take care, dear nurses, attendants, doctors, and paramedics. Thank you for everything you do for us. Be strong and healthy.

And our readers can today raise the fighting fifty grams to those who are at the front line.

Natallia Radzina, Editor-in-Chief at Charter97.org

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