BUFFALO (WBEN) - It's been a year.
It was exactly one year ago Thursday that the World Health Organization officially declared COVID-19 a pandemic. As of Wednesday afternoon, the virus has killed 528,000 Americans.
The heroes, through everything, have always been the frontline healthcare workers that put their own bodies at risk for the sake of others.
One such worker is Dr. Samuel Cloud, the associate medical director at ECMC, who also serves as an attending physician in the emergency department.
Cloud started monitoring the "emerging virus" in January of 2020 - similar to what he had done with other viruses such as MERS and Ebola.
"I started becoming concerned probably by late January that this was going to make its way to the United States and not kind of burn itself out like SARS had," said Cloud. "When it hit the United States in late January and into February, then alarm bells were going off for all of us that we needed to start preparing that this could race across the United States."
And that's exactly what they did.
ECMC staff began planning in February, and the hospital received its first case in March.
"It was terrifying," he said. "I'm an ER doctor, so I was on the front lines - it was very scary coming to work those first few weeks.
Cloud said that healthcare providers are always doing their best to "manage chaos." They learned to adapt quickly because, really, they didn't really have a choice. Staff worked to establish safety protocols that could more easily identify patients and keep them away from others.
"We pretty quickly learned how to manage this condition, which obviously none of us had ever seen before, and quite frankly, had never seen a virus quite like it," said Cloud.
On May 28, the United States passed the 100,000 deaths mark, and on June 10, the number of cases in the country hit 2 million. On July 16, the U.S. reported a new record of 75,600 cases in a single day. On August 17, COVID became the third leading cause of death. On September 28, global COVID deaths surpassed 1 million. On October 2, then President Trump and First Lady Melania Trump tested positive for the virus. On November 4, the United States reported a then unprecedented 100,000 cases in a single day.
Cloud noted that the second wave in the fall was much worse for hospital systems in terms of resources than what took place in the spring, even though treatment was more advanced.
"We really got stretched in early January, and we stayed that way for a while," said Cloud. "But now that the numbers are coming down dramatically, we're starting to get back to normal operations."
While we're not yet in the clear, vaccine supply has been ramping up significantly, some states are starting to lift many of their restrictions, and life, for many, is starting to resemble pre-pandemic norms.
"I pray to God that we never go through anything like this again because, yes, it was the most challenging professional year I've ever had," said Cloud, also imploring people to get vaccinated when the opportunity presents.
"I think (the pandemic) has made me personally more grateful, and it has made me more proud of my profession," he continued. "When you see your profession step up and put their own personal safety at risk...to do the right thing for patients, it's very gratifying."
