On Saturday, as people across the country celebrate American independence, Shakell Avery will celebrate a different kind of freedom.
Covid-19 Freedom.
“It feels amazing,” Avery told CNN. “After knowing what I’ve been through, it’s still difficult to understand. But I am very grateful and grateful that he is still here.”
Avery, who turned 24 on July 4, recently returned home after spending 76 days in a Kansas hospital, many of them sedated and ventilated, battling the new coronavirus.
“I’m going to be home safe and sound with my family,” said Avery, a barber from Kansas City, Missouri, when asked how he would celebrate his birthday and Independence Day. “I am sure there will be many other birthdays in the future where I can make up for this.”
For now, Avery is focused on sharing her journey with others her age and warning them to take coronavirus seriously, as cases in the US are on the rise among young people.
“You are as at risk as anyone else,” said Avery. “You can be the healthiest person on Earth, and still risk your life every time you carelessly go out and act like it’s not real.”
“It is very real,” he said. “They almost took me out of my family.”
‘I felt someone was suffocating me’
When Avery arrived at the Menorah Medical Center in Overland Park, Kansas, on April 6, she says she had what felt like every Covid-19 symptom, including chills, high fever, and body aches. But what worried her most was her shortness of breath.
“Even if I had to breathe deeply, I felt like someone was suffocating me,” he said.
“I was definitely thinking something bad was about to happen,” said Avery. “I immediately thought of my son. I immediately thought of my family.”
Avery says she remembers very little of what came next. Once she arrived at the hospital, Avery remembers getting out of her car and getting into a wheelchair. He has a slight memory of being taken to the intensive care unit.
“I don’t mean that I started to panic,” he said, “but I was definitely scared. That’s not a normal patient room. That’s where you are seriously ill.”
Before becoming ill, Avery had taken precautions to ensure the safety of her family in the midst of a lockdown, such as making sure there was enough food.
“But I can’t say I took it as seriously as I needed to,” he said. “I didn’t think it was as serious as it is.”
‘Older people get this virus’
Shakell’s mother Willetta Avery says her son started getting sick in late March, when some health guide had not become what he is now. At the time, U.S. officials were still debating whether to issue a mask guide, and the World Health Organization encouraged people to wear masks only if they were sick.
“My opinion on this was that older people get this virus and are more susceptible in terms of actually getting sick,” said Willetta Avery.
“Hearing that my son was going through this was very, very scary,” she said, adding that things “came true” when she learned that her son needed a fan.
“And not knowing much about fans … it scared me knowing I was going to have to use one of those,” he said. “It was then that the severity of his illness gave me a slap in the face.”
Willetta Avery remembers receiving a call from the hospital at 4:30 a.m. on April 11.
“Basically they were telling us that Shakell was maxing out on the vent bracket, that they couldn’t do much else,” he said.
The hospital finally allowed her to see her son.
“It was like I was seeing him for the last time,” he said.
Avery’s doctors at Menorah Medical Center collaborated with doctors at Research Medical Center in Kansas City, both of whom are part of the HCA Healthcare system, to treat him with convalescent plasma.
Treatment involves intravenous application of blood serum from recovered patients in the hope that their antibodies may help reactivate a patient’s immune response. The method is being experimentally tested against coronavirus infections, and it’s unclear if it helps.
According to HCA Healthcare, on April 20, Avery became one of the first patients in the region to receive convalescent plasma after obtaining it from a fully recovered Covid-19 patient in New York. Willetta Avery says that after receiving the plasma, her son’s condition began to improve.
“I will never forget the first day she opened her eyes after we rejected her sedation,” Jessica Knox, a registered nurse at Menorah Medical, told CNN affiliate WDAF. “I called her uncle and I said, ‘OMG she’s awake, like we’ve turned a major corner.'”
‘I beat Covid-19’
After Shakell returned, he still had trouble fighting the virus.
“Being independent, you are used to doing everything on your own,” he said.
But he needed help getting up and going to the bathroom. He could not speak or walk. He also struggled with depression in the hospital, particularly when his family visited him in a tent that the hospital installed outside his window.
“It was a great moment at the time, but as soon as they left, I went back downstairs,” he said. “It was really difficult to be away from my girlfriend. It was difficult to be away from my son, my mother and my brothers.”
Avery finally started improving and got off the fan. He started physical therapy and was sent to a full rehabilitation center, where he was discharged late last month.
Shakell returned to Menorah Medical Center with his family on Tuesday to thank the staff for helping him.
Images from KMBC affiliate KMBC show Avery outside the hospital wearing a walker, and a mask, in a black shirt that says, “I beat Covid-19.” Some nurses who greeted her family carried signs saying “Shakell Strong” and “Shakell, you are our hero.”
“I was more than grateful,” said Avery. “He could have said ‘thank you’ an infinite number of times, and it wouldn’t have matched the intensity of how grateful he was.”
Avery has a message for young people, and says he wants to be “as direct as possible.”
“Every time you carelessly walk out your door, without a mask or empathy for someone else’s life, you are counting your days,” he said.
“My advice would simply be to try not to be selfish, but as selfless as possible,” he said. “Because you’re not just hurting yourself.”
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