COVID Christmas in French ICU: Fear, fatigue and loving care

MARSEILLE, France (AP) — From the intensive care ward in France where he is spending the holidays, COVID-19 patient David Daniel Sebbagh said he has one overriding regret: that he didn’t get vaccinated.

“The vaccine, it’s not a danger," the 52-year-old said as he lay in a Marseille hospital. “It’s choosing life.”

The ICU's chief doctor, Dr. Julien Carvelli, is trying to keep his team motivated as they spend another Christmas tending to patients on breathing machines, periodically flipping them back to front, front to back.

The staff is tired, the omicron variant is bearing down, and the unit's beds are filling fast. “We’re afraid we won’t have enough space,” Carvelli said.

Marseille’s La Timone Hospital, one of France’s biggest hospitals, has weathered wave after wave of COVID-19. On Christmas Eve, medical personnel decorated a fir tree in the corridor and seized a moment for a communal meal in their scrubs, trying to maintain a semblance of holiday spirit in between rounds.

The hospital allows families to visit gravely ill loved ones in the ICU, as long as they’re careful. Amelie Khayat has paid daily visits to her husband, Ludo, 41, who spent 24 days in a coma and on a breathing machine. The couple touched heads as she sat on his bed. Now strong enough to stand, he stood to give her a farewell hug.

In a nearby room, a 40-year-old patient lay unconscious near death, with her young son’s winter hat placed on her belly. In another, a relative had left a Christian icon propped on a patient’s tray.

Down the hall, Katy Zalinian waited anxiously to visit her cousin. She later entered his room wearing full protective gear and touched her hand lovingly to his leg.

While some 90% of French adults are vaccinated against the coronavirus and some 40% have received a booster...