Pan 11 - The Covid test

Based on inputs from the doctors in family, we headed to the 'Government Fever Hospital' in nallakunta........koranti hospital as it's locally called.

When I told diksha we were going to 'fever hospital', she was like "what??? there's a hospital called 'fever hospital'?". 

Well, there is. While it's called the 'Ronald Ross Institute of Tropical and Communicable Diseases', all old hyderabadis will know it as 'koranti dawakhana' or 'fever hospital'.

And strangely enough 'koranti' is the localized word for 'quarantine'. for which this hospital was established all of hundred years back, in what was then the city's outskirts.

While I've passed it a thousand times going to my mom's and ammamma's place of work which was further down the road, I hadn't even seen this massive name board ever.

Infact ammamma had told me a story of how during the plague they had created a shelter  in the area, with a lot of tents, which was mandatory for all people who lived in tiled houses as they would invariably have rats in their rafters....and how some of our relatives had to also move.

My mum also recalls how they would bring the clothes of infected people and burn them at a lake in front of their house, also in the same area (this must have likely been the spanish flu)

Anyways, to come back to the present.....

As we drove there with those tight covid masks on,  I'm telling diksha "how on earth did you wear this mask for all of twenty hours ma........I'm sweating within it.... so much so I think I'm drinking my sweat", and she's like, "chiiiii maaa, just stop talking no" :)

We entered the fever hospital with that tight knot in the pit of the stomach.....guess it represented a mixture of apprehension and anxiety.........not as much of covid at that point, but of just a 'government hospital',  we've all heard enough to feel that way I guess, right?

We drove into an iron gate........down a long driveway (guess that fits for isolation and quarantines), past a spattering of people in coats and masks......and then really old looking boards which read; 'malaria ward'..... 'small pox ward'......the knot getting tighter......and then took a left to ward VII as directed, and drove into a nice parking lot. (an urban relief even amidst covid :)

The hospital itself is a sprawling complex of single storied buildings......old yes, but otherwise nice. The isolation ward we went to had about twenty beds, with new mattresses on each of the beds, the fans were new and working, the bedsheets were old and worn out but visibly just back from laundry.

The bedsheet on diksha's bed had a potent looking stain on it.......and I went hunting for another bedsheet to cover that. Those are also scary moments as you don't know what you can touch and what not. 

Sure it's not your five star corporate hospital, but it's nothing like what people are posting online. People don't seem to have the maturity to reset expectations depending on context. It only reaffirmed to me that people who think negative will be cribbers no matter what, and unfortunately they are the loudest and most visible too.

Infact, as diksha waited for her test, I even braved a peep into the bathrooms, everyone's nightmare right.......and while old, it was yet clean.

And old means really really old....when I was searching online for how old, I found a Hansindia article saying it completed hundred years  in 2015

While everyone in the premises, the doctors, the nurses, the lab assistants were all in their hazmat coats, and talking through their masks....I found each of them pleasant, friendly and efficient.

(While Diksha was the only one in the ward when we went in, within the hour a large bunch of people came in, and I learnt from one of them that they were a team of airport employees who have been doing the passenger covid checks.....and one of their colleagues had tested positive, and that's why they were all asked to take the test)

At first a doctor came in and took a detailed report of diksha's symptoms and some medical background. And then diksha had to wait a while for the lab assistant. Those were her rather tense minutes I think, as she was like "ma, ask them if it will hurt". (it took effort to not let my tears escape)

The test itself is a swab taken from deep inside the throat and the nasal chamber. Not painful at all.

And then it was waiting for the results......twenty four nail biting hours, a twenty four hours that we spent away from talking or even thinking covid.

She tested negative. omg, omg.......the relief experienced is near impossible to describe :)