Covid vaccine: Medical specialist reveals ICU patients admit regret at not getting the jab

Scores of unvaccinated Covid-19 patients who have suffered with the virus in a Queensland ICU have admitted they wish they’d got the jab, as a medical specialist reveals the main reasons patients were not immunised.

About 75 per cent of patients in intensive care at the peak of the Gold Coast’s Omicron wave were unvaccinated, and “pretty much all of them” regretted their decision, a medical specialist says.

Dr Jon Field, an intensive care specialist at the Gold Coast University Hospital, said staff did not delve too deeply into why patients were not immunised, but he said “misinformation and misunderstanding” were the main reasons.

But the surge was not as severe as the hospital had planned for, with intensive care admissions for Covid-19 peaking at 15 patients on January 15. An expansion of the 25 to 30 bed ICU was not required.

TERRIFIED, GASPING FOR BREATH AND DYING: INSIDE QLD’S BUSIEST COVID ICU

Dr Field said the hospital had managed the surge well, praising the staff for being willing to take on new roles and learn skills outside their normal area of work.

“This is our moment to help, to shine, and do what we can at a difficult time,” he said. “I think we’ll look back on it and go, ‘We’ve done everything we can in a difficult situation’.”

Dr Jon Field, an intensive care specialist at the Gold Coast University Hospital. Picture: Russell Shakespeare

Gold Coast hospital admissions peaked on January 20, with 202 patients either in ICU or in one of eight wards devoted to Covid patients across the GCUH and Robina Hospital. About 30 Gold Coast residents have died with Covid-19.

The GCUH head of emergency, Dr David Green, said some people arrived at the emergency department frightened, struggling for breath and incoherent. Others had a mild cough.

It was “relatively common” to deal with sick, unvaccinated patients who denied they had Covid-19.

Dr Green struggles to understand why some people will not get vaccinated.

“It’s incredibly sad that you’ve got all this research out there, creating a lifesaving vaccine that they refuse to use and it’s free and available,” Dr Green said. “You know, I just don’t get that bit.”

Michelle Kimmins has nursed the dying during the surge. Picture: Russell Shakespeare

Michelle Kimmins, the nurse unit manager on the main Covid ward, said some unvaccinated patients had asked if they could be vaccinated after contracting the virus and ending up on the ward.

Nurses have been verbally abused but Ms Kimmins said that was more prevalent prior to the Omicron wave, when there was mandatory hospital quarantine for travellers.

“As our patients are getting sicker, they’re getting less aggressive towards us,” she said.

Ms Kimmins said it was tough for worried patients to be kept in isolation in their rooms and be tended by medical staff in full personal protective equipment.

“About all they can see is our eyes,” Kimmins says. “So, it is challenging for them.”

Ms Kimmins said that being able to make a difference to patients and nurse them through a difficult time was rewarding.

“I know that sounds clichéd, but it’s important and it’s what we do,” she said. “It’s why we come to work every day.”

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