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Midland ICU nurse on COVID-19: "It's very real"

One ICU nurse at Midland Memorial wants everyone to understand how serious this pandemic is.

MIDLAND, Texas — Jessica McBryde, an ICU nurse at MMH, is trying to show everyone what this virus looks like up close. 

She's been frustrated with the unwillingness of some people to wear a mask.

Two weeks ago her frustration came to a boil, and she sent out a Facebook post detailing what the virus is like, which has now been shared by over 1,000 people.

McBryde said that people need to see what frontline workers are dealing with. 

She believes that an influx of conflicting information might be leading to some mistrust and defiance from the community.

After sending this post out, McBryde received many messages of support from the community, although there was some negativity as well.

"It was surprisingly very supportive. I had a lot of positive feedback. Of course, there’s always gonna be negativity that comes with it, but most of it was very supportive. People supporting us as front line workers, people supporting us as a community," McBryde said.

McBryde wanted to show what COVID-19 actually does to a person. It starts with a patient not receiving enough oxygen and gets worse from there.

"We're seeing kidney failure, patients that have never had kidney issues requiring dialysis. We’re seeing people's hearts stop because their bodies aren’t getting enough oxygen from the lungs to keep their heart going. It’s just affecting the whole system," McBryde said.

When the pandemic first started, McBryde got a lot of questions from friends asking whether this pandemic is as dangerous and as serious as everyone is making it out to be. 

"It is very real," McBryde said. 

At the beginning of the pandemic, MMH had only around three or four patients in the COVID ICU. Now, they've nearly maxed out and are having to move patients upstairs to another floor.

McBryde hopes that the community will do their part by wearing masks and standing six feet apart from one another.

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