Zach Morris might be one of the first people in Bloomington-Normal to have contracted COVID-19.
Morris, 31, suspects he caught it after taking the train down to St. Louis for the Missouri Valley Conference men’s basketball tournament in early March. He started to feel sluggish March 9. The next day he couldn’t get out of bed. He pretty much slept for the next three days, quarantined in his basement away from his wife, Lauren, and their two young children.
“I couldn’t go up my stairs without huffing and puffing. By the end of it, I couldn’t finish a whole sentence without struggling through it,” Zach said. “This was easily the sickest I can remember being.”
While older Americans and those with severe underlying medical conditions are most at risk, there is evidence the virus is affecting young people in the U.S. at higher rates than in other countries.
Morris said he works out regularly and is a college-hockey referee. Until now, his lung capacity was fine.
“This knocked me out,” he said. “It’s the real deal.”
Like many other McLean County residents showing COVID-19 symptoms, Morris has not been tested. A shortage of test supplies means they’re only available to patients meeting certain criteria, such as being admitted to the hospital. Some argue that’s skewing the public’s view of how many infected people there are in Bloomington-Normal. There have only been nine confirmed cases in McLean County.
Morris said he wasn’t upset about not being tested. He just assumed he had it based on his symptoms.
“We were already quarantining me to the basement anyway,” he said about not being tested.
Doctors are reporting cases where a loss of the sense of taste and the sense of smell, in particular, has been seen in patients who later tested positive for the coronavirus. That happened to Morris too.
Morris is on the mend now. He’s still a little congested but has gone back to work (from home).
“It’s frustrating to see how many people aren’t really taking anything seriously,” Morris told WGLT. “Whether you believe in the full lockdown or not, something has to be done to curb this. I’ve had some run-ins with some of my close friends who think it’s all a joke, and they’re out living their normal lives and going places. But I guess we’ll see in the end.”
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