GOP lawmaker who once spurned masks urges people to take covid-19 seriously after eight-month illness - The Washington Post

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A Tennessee legislator who went from unmasked gatherings with fellow legislators to being placed on ventilator days later has emerged with a message for constituents after a harrowing eight-month experience with long-haul covid-19:

“It is a disease that wants to kill us,” state Rep. David Byrd (R) said in a statement Friday. Byrd, 63, described an ordeal that included 55 days on a ventilator in which covid-19 ravaged his memory, his muscles and his organs — it led to him having a liver transplant in June; his condition was so grave that his family at least once began planning for his funeral. Stressing that covid-19 is real and “very dangerous,” Byrd encouraged people to get vaccinated.

“This is not an issue that should divide us,” he wrote.

The shift from minimizing the risks of the coronavirus to urgently warning about them is not unique to Byrd, who did not respond to The Washington Post’s request for comment Sunday. A growing group of Americans, including some Republicans, are now rapidly reassessing their doubts and dismissals as new infections fueled by the easier-to-spread delta variant of the virus point toward a summer virus surge.

Leaders such as Alabama Gov. Kay Ivey (R) and Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson (R) have traveled their states and written opinion articles encouraging people to get vaccinated. In Tennessee, state Rep. Bryan Terry (R), who is a physician, urged vaccinations after becoming infected after he was immunized.

“I’m convinced the vaccine protected my health and possibly saved me from an extensive hospitalization, or death,” Terry said last week. “All Tennesseans, especially those with risk, need to talk to their doctor about getting vaccinated.”

In Wayne County, Tenn., which encompasses Byrd’s district of rural Waynesboro, less than a third of adults are fully vaccinated, according to data tracked by The Post. Wayne County’s 31 percent fully vaccinated rate is below Tennessee’s rate of 39 percent and the United States’ overall rate of 49.6 percent.

As cases of the coronavirus surge across the United States, health officials and politicians discussed masking and potential restrictions on Aug. 1. (Amber Ferguson/The Washington Post)

In his statement Friday, Byrd said he was sharing his experience in hopes that it “helps others to act against an enemy that knows no skin color, economic status or political affiliation.”

He chronicled the terrifying “lightning speed” with which covid-19 overtook his lungs: a diagnosis a day before Thanksgiving. “Every breath was pure agony,” Byrd wrote of the period before his Dec. 5 hospitalization.

“Everything that can go wrong with Covid did,” he wrote. “Despite the excellent care I received, I got sicker. The virus invaded my lungs and organs and it wasn’t looking good for me. My wife and family prayed for a miracle while facing the very real prospect of planning my funeral.”

As he was placed under anesthesia before being intubated, Byrd said, he realized he might not wake up. When he came off a ventilator nearly two months later, he said, he faced a “brutal and lonely” recovery during which he was unable to walk or use his arms.

He repeatedly expressed gratitude for his family, which he said was traumatized by the experience, and for the health-care providers who looked after him.

At least 10 state lawmakers in the United States have died of covid-19 since the pandemic began last year, according to Ballotpedia.

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