An IL woman tested negative for COVID-19 but her doctor is convinced she had the virus. Here’s what went wrong
ALTON, Ill. (KMOV.com) — An Alton woman said her COVID-19 test came back negative, but said she and her doctor are confident she had the novel coronavirus. She blames the negative results on the delay in the Madison County Health Department getting her tested.
Nancy Hultz said she started getting symptoms on March 18.
“I got a major headache on the right side of my head that was different than any headache I had and I had that dry cough. I thought ‘do I have mono, do I have a sinus infection, what is going on here,'” said Hultz.
Hultz said she was also extremely fatigued and was having difficulty breathing. She decided to call her doctor.
“She said, ‘no sweetie, you don’t have any of that other stuff, you have the coronavirus,'” said Hultz. “She gave me the health department’s phone number. She said ‘you call them, you report it, and you see what they want to do about sending you for testing.’”
Hultz said it took a week before she got a call back from the health department. By the time she was sent for testing, Hultz said she was in her fourth week of symptoms.
Her test came back negative, though Hultz believes it’s because the virus was already out of her system.
“I asked the health department why it took so long for me to get tested and they said ‘because we don’t have enough tests.’ They said ‘we are only testing the people who actually go to the hospital and check themselves in,'” said Hultz.
As of Saturday, the Illinois Department of Public Health reported 299,896 COVID-19 tests had been performed. Of those, 58,529 were confirmed positive. Still, Illinois lags behind other states in testing.
“If we have thousands of people at home with this that we don’t even know about then how can we keep track of it?” said Hultz.
Dr. Alex Garza with the St. Louis Metropolitan Pandemic Task Force called the lack of testing a ‘supply chain issue.’
“It does impact our ability to decrease transmission because we’re missing some of those cases that we might have gotten if we had more supplies to do testing,” said Garza.
Hultz is hoping to do the antibody test to confirm whether she had it so she can help someone else fighting the virus. The CDC says the antibody tests are slowly becoming available through healthcare providers.
News 4 reached out to the Madison County Health Department and is waiting to hear back.
Photo Credit: kmov.com
Heavily tattooed Florida man allegedly abducted, drugged, beat woman in camper
A Florida man with extensive full-body tattoos who allegedly drugged, abducted and sexually battered a woman in a run-down camper earlier this year has been arrested, the local sheriff announced Thursday.
Efthimios Michael Zachary Mikedis, also known as Zak, a 28-year-old from Ocklawaha, allegedly attacked the victim with an accomplice on Jan. 5.
When the victim regained consciousness, Mikedis allegedly burned her hair with a cigarette and held a pair of scissors to her throat before beating her, dragging her to a waiting car and eventually letting her go at a Winn-Dixie parking lot.
Mikedis had told the victim that he would give her a ride from Orange County to her aunt’s home in Marion County, according to the Marion County Sheriff’s Office.
He arrived to pick her up with his mother, Shannon James, in the driver’s seat and another man in the vehicle, the sheriff’s office said. Investigators have identified the second man as Robert McDaniel.
The victim told police Mikedis looked like someone you would “be instantly scared of” and he had what appeared to be a gun in his waistband.
The victim told him she no longer wanted the ride, according to authorities, but Mikedis ordered her into the vehicle.
Then he allegedly forced an unknown substance down her throat, pinned her to the floor, drove to a residence and brought her to a camper parked on the property, police said.
The victim began to black out, but she told investigators that she was sexually battered by Mikedis, abused with an unidentified object and then assaulted by another individual at Mikedis’ apparent urging.
The sheriff’s office said the victim heard Mikedis saying, “Go, go,” before the second person battered her.
She awoke and tried to call an Uber car, but Mikedis allegedly forced another unknown substance down her throat, burned her hair, punched her in the back of the head and dragged her across the property into his mother’s car once again.
He eventually forced her out of the car at a grocery store parking lot, according to police.
Mikedis faces one count of sexual battery and is being held in the Marion County Jail, authorities said.
The sheriff’s office said more arrests and more charges could be coming as the investigation continues.
Anyone with information on Robert McDaniel is asked to contact Detective Jessica Galler at (352) 368-3535.
via: https://nypost.com/2020/05/01/heavily-tattooed-florida-man-allegedly-abducted-drugged-beat-woman/
Photo Credit: Marion County Sheriff’s Office
Florida weatherman’s dog interrupts forecast in the most adorable way
The forecast was ruff for a Florida weatherman whose hungry dog sabotaged his live report by hopping up on his lap and knocking into his computer.
FOX WTVT’s meteorologist Paul Dellegatto was filming the segment at his home near Tampa Bay when his adorable golden retriever, Brody, jumped up to beg for snacks, according to orlandoweekly.com.
“The map’s not gonna move because he just whacked the computer with his head, so let me just verbalize the forecast, OK?” Dellegatto says in the footage, trying his best to continue.
“That wasn’t very smart,” he scolds, wagging a finger at the pooch, who then climbs up onto his lap.
As he finishes the forecast — “clouds overnight tonight” — the pup lets out a big, rude yawn.
The four-legged saboteur then disappears off camera, only to stick his furry head into the final shot.
Oh boy,” Dellegatto groans. “That’s not good.”
Observers quickly took to social media, calling the report un-fur-gettable.
via: https://nypost.com/2020/04/30/dog-interrupts-weathermans-forecast-in-the-most-adorable-fashion/
Photo Credit: diply.com
Texas park ranger pushed into lake while trying to enforce social distance regulations
A Texas park ranger was pushed into a lake while trying to enforcing social distancing regulations in Austin.
The plunge was caught on camera at Lake Austin on Thursday, with the clip beginning as the ranger seemingly politely asks a group of parkgoers to disperse and keep six feet apart to help stop the spread of the coronavirus.
But then a shirtless man, identified by police as Brandon Hicks, 25, can be seen running up and shoving the ranger, sending both into the water.
Hicks is then allegedly recorded jumping out and running off into the distance.
Hicks was arrested and faces charges of attempted assault on a public servant, according to the local NBC affiliate.
“Brandon’s intentional and reckless action could have caused the Ranger to strike his head on the dock as he was falling, and render himself unconscious in at least 3 feet of water where he could have drowned to death,” the arrest affidavit said, according to the outlet.
The person who recorded the video told the outlet that they were happy the culprit was caught.
“The park ranger was actually being really sweet and understanding before,” the video-taker said.
The incident comes as officials across the country grapple with keeping crowds at bay as warming weather attracts residents in locked down states to public parks and beaches.
In New York City, cops flooded city parks to enforce social distancing rules across the city, with one resident complaining of “Orwellian” levels of surveillance.
Photo Credit: Austin Police Dept
NYC Dr Carmeron Kyle- SIDELL His thoughts treating COVID 19
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104-year-old woman beats coronavirus: “I think it’s a miracle”
NEW YORK (CBS) — Ida Acconciamessa has survived stage 4 melanoma, faced two broken hips, and lived through the Spanish Flu. Now, at 104 years old, she just beat the coronavirus.
“We really didn’t think she was going to be able to pull through this,” her daughter, 77-year-old Barbara Senese, told CBS News. “She wasn’t even able to speak. She was lifeless. And now she’s eating. She’s talking.”
Senese said both she and her sister Johann Giordano, who both used to visit their mother almost every day, last saw her in person at the Sheepshead Nursing and Rehabilitation Center in Brooklyn on March 26, where they were able to see her outside of her window on the first floor, both wearing masks and gloves.
“They brought her to us in a wheelchair by the window. The window was open just a tiny bit so she could hear our voices,” Senese said. “She didn’t move a muscle and she stared at us. Just a stare. I don’t think I’ll ever forget that — ever. We were begging her for 10 to 15 minutes to say something. She said nothing. When we walked away, I said to my sister, she’s sick. She has the virus.”
A week later, on April 4, Senese said she got a call from a social worker at the nursing facility, saying Acconciamessa had tested positive for COVID-19.
“It was a really rough go. I used to just break down and cry,” Senese said.
She said for her mother, coronavirus started with a very bad cough, “and then after that she went strictly downhill.” Acconciamessa became very weak, was put on oxygen, and could barely speak or eat.
“If we tried to call, she didn’t have the strength to take [the phone] off the cradle to speak to us. She sometimes would just say, ‘Too weak, too weak. can’t talk.'”
Other times, when the family tried to video chat with Acconciamessa through a service the nursing facility provides, “ninety percent of the time, my mother was out of it, totally. Eyes closed, in a bed no response,” Senese said.
The family was afraid that due to her age, and recently recovering from both a fractured hip and another highly contagious infection called c.diff, that it was unlikely for her to pull through the coronavirus. The virus can be particularly deadly for elderly people who already have compromised immune systems.
“My mom made me promise her seven months ago, that when it was her time to be called home back to God, that she would die in her own home,” Senese said. “I said of course, mom, of course. So that tortured me because I remember how she made me promise her… I never thought that if she did pass away, that I would not be with her holding her hand or comforting her during her final days. And that became, for my sister and myself, mental torture,” she said.
But on Friday, April 24, the family received a call from the head nurse caring for Acconciamessa, saying that she was doing “much, much better” and that they might consider letting her go home. On May 1, when CBS News spoke to Senese, she described her mother as “very chatty.”
“At 104 years, I think it’s a miracle to survive through COVID,” said Marco Perrone, the Nursing Administration Supervisor at the facility. “We have people 40, 50 years old, passing due to COVID. So, 104 years old it’s amazing she was able to survive through this.“
Acconciamessa’s daughter describes her as a woman who is a “fighter,” and has always had a positive attitude in life, which she believes has given her “an underlying strength to conquer things.”
Until the age 95, she walked five miles a day in Marine Park, Brooklyn, which she called the “health park,” because she loved to exercise, Senese said. She also ate a red McIntosh apple and drank a glass of red wine every single day until age 102.
“She always used to say, ‘I was born under a lucky star.’ That was her mantra in life. And you know what? To be able to get through this virus, those words often come to my mind,” Senese said.
Photo Credit: kmov.com