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ELM GROVE, Wisconsin: Eight nuns who lived in a suburban Milwaukee sisters’ retirement home died of complications from COVID-19 in the past week, including four who died the same day, a sad reminder of how quickly the Viruses can spread in life in congregational situations, even when precautions are taken.
Notre Dame de Elm Grove had been free of the virus for the past nine months, but the congregation running the home discovered on Thanksgiving that one of the approximately 100 sisters who live there had tested positive.
Despite social distancing and other mitigation efforts that were already underway, several more positive tests followed, said Sister Debra Marie Sciano, provincial leader of the School Sisters of the Central Pacific Province of Notre Dame.
The first death occurred last week, and the death announcements kept coming. Four of the eight nuns died on Monday alone (December 14), a difficult situation for other sisters in the home and members of the larger congregation, who consider themselves family.
“Even though they are older and most of the sisters who went to God are in their 80s and 90s … we didn’t expect them to go so, so fast,” Sciano said. “So it was very difficult for us.”
Sciano said the congregation isolated sisters who tested positive in the same area so they would not have contact with other people. They are advised to stay in their rooms, where meals are brought to them. Funerals and memorial services are broadcast on closed circuit television. Sciano declined to say how many other sisters tested positive, citing the privacy of residents.
The outbreak comes months after similar households reported multiple deaths from the coronavirus. In July, 13 nuns died in a convent near Detroit and seven died in a center for Maryknoll sisters in New York.
At least six nuns also died at Our Lady of the Angels Convent in Greenfield, Wisconsin, a home that provides memory care to the nuns of the Sisters of the School of St. Francis and the Sisters of the School of Notre Dame.
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Earlier this month, church authorities said 76 Catholic nuns tested positive for COVID-19 after an outbreak at a Franciscan convent in northwestern Germany, forcing health authorities to put the entire monastery in quarantine.
Sciano said Our Lady of the Angels in Greenfield has had no additional positive cases for many months, and the facility still does not allow visits.
Deena Swank, communications director for the Felecian Sisters of North America, which lost 13 sisters, about a fifth of the population at the Livonia, Michigan convent, said they have had no further deaths there and are eager to vaccinate the sisters when possible. .
Sciano said she doesn’t know that anyone in the Notre Dame of Elm Grove home is on a priority list for vaccines, but administrators are reaching out to local pharmacies to try to get vaccines ready for the future.
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Convents share some of the same problems as nursing homes, which are the hardest hit sector in the US in terms of deaths from COVID-19. In many cases, their populations are older people and they live in confined spaces with each other.
Linda Wickstrom, a spokeswoman for the Waukesha County Department of Health and Human Services, said county disease investigators have been working with the facility since they were contacted by the School Sisters of Notre Dame in November.
“Given the extreme contagion of this virus, it is extremely important that congregated settings practice basic protocols to stop the spread of the disease,” Wickstrom said.
She said the Notre Dame School Sisters have been disinfecting high-touch surfaces, frequent hand washing, social distancing and wearing appropriate face coverings. Sciano said all residents with the virus have been isolated and no visitors are allowed.
The Sisters of Notre Dame School established Notre Dame de Elm Grove house in 1859 to provide an orphanage for children in the area. It later became a home for older and sick sisters, according to its website.
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The first COVID-19 death at the facility occurred on December 9, when sisters Rose M. Feess and Mary Elva Wiesner died. Sister Dorothy MacIntyre died on December 11 and Sister Mary Alexius Portz died on Sunday, according to the congregation’s website. Sisters Cynthia Borman, Joan Emily Kaul, Lillia Langreck and Michael Marie Laux died Monday.
Sciano said that all the women worked as educators. Some were missionaries. Some were musicians. Some worked on issues of peace and justice. One was a published poet. According to the congregation’s website, one was a teacher and principal who loved to work in the summers on an American Indian reservation in South Dakota. Another taught in Catholic elementary schools for more than 40 years and worked part-time as the coordinator of the gift shop at the Elm Grove home.
“We believe that each one of these sisters, and all the sisters, really, have made a difference in this world,” Sciano said, adding, “I think it is important that people know that and that they are committed until the end of their lives. lives “.
She said she hopes others can learn from the sisters’ lives and continue her mission to “maybe make this world a little better because of them.”
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