Things got better in 2021 when they moved into a retirement community with staff on hand to help. But by late 2022, China’s anti-Covid strategy was being strained by public fatigue and the highly transmissible omicron variant, and the government announced its end. Suddenly, life in China went from zero-Covid to almost zero restrictions — and not everyone was prepared.
“The zero-Covid policy I think really made people numb about how dangerous this virus is,” said the couple’s daughter, who lives on the East Coast and is a U.S. citizen.
Staff members at the retirement community were still testing residents regularly, going from door to door. The mother’s PCR test on Dec. 23 came back positive, but the family was not informed, the daughter said. If they had been, she said, they would have told her to immediately take the Paxlovid antiviral medication they had sent from abroad.
On Christmas morning in China, the mother suddenly fell unconscious, and an ambulance was called. A rapid test administered by paramedics came back positive, and she was taken to the hospital where her condition quickly deteriorated as the daughter and other family members watched over video.
She died about 16 hours after the positive rapid test.
“She never opened her eyes to see us,” the daughter said. “She didn’t say anything to us.”
The mother’s death certificate, the daughter said, lists her cause of death as “community transmitted pneumonia,” followed by a question mark in brackets. She had tested positive again at the hospital, “but still on her death certificate there’s no Covid mentioned,” the daughter said.
Cremation facilities in the city and nearby smaller cities were all full, the daughter said, and the family had to use connections to find one a three-hour drive away. The family’s experience is consistent with satellite images at the time that showed heightened activity at Chinese crematoriums and funeral homes.
Days later, the daughter met her father in another Asian country before taking him back to the U.S. — without his wife of more than 60 years.
“My 90-year-old dad was crying,” she said. “He couldn’t believe Mom passed away like that. Mom didn’t say a final word to him, either.”
Source: | This article originally belongs to Nbcnews.com
