(WBBM NEWSRADIO) -- The mayor and police chief of Robbins and others on Thursday welcomed back an officer who recovered from a long battle with COVID-19.
Officer Edward Schmit said he was in bad shape when paramedics rushed him to Palos Community Hospital in the middle of March. He credits his fiance, Brenda Restaino, with making the life-saving phone call.
"I was turning blue and gray. The paramedics finally told us if she never called 9-1-1, I would have probably been dead in 15 minutes,” he recalled.
The 48-year old was put on a ventilator within a couple of hours of arriving and given hydroxychloroquine, a drug that is now not advised as a COVID-19 treatment.
Schmit says he was on the ventilator for seven days and spent a total of 12 days in the hospital before being discharged to spend the next two months recovering at home.
"When I was leaving, the main doctor came in and told me they only gave me a 20% chance of living," he said.
He said he appreciated Thursday’s "Welcome Back" ceremony outside the Robbins Police Department, which made him feel "very proud and wanted."
Mayor Tyrone Ward calls Schmit "one of those guys who you love to have on your force or as a part of your team."
Officer Schmit says his brush with death has given him a new outlook.
"You look at life a whole lot differently now and respect life more and every day's a new day," he said.
Even though public health experts say hydroxychloroquine is not advised for someone who has COVID-19, Officer Schmit said he believes it helped save him.