Coronavirus NSW: Decorated ex-cop fighting for life after Ruby Princess trip
A decorated former police officer is fighting for life in intensive care while his wife, unable to comfort him, is quarantined at home. The couple’s daughter, unable to visit either, likened the COVID-19 virus to wartime saying it’s ‘the enemy we can’t see’.
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A former high-ranking NSW police officer is fighting for life in intensive care while his wife waits anxiously at home in quarantine, unable to comfort him.
His distraught daughter, unable to visit either her gravely ill dad or her mum, likened the horror gripping her family and the world to wartime.
The 74-year-old fell ill on the Ruby Princess but was one of thousands allowed to leave Circular Quay and drive 90 minutes home to Wollongong with his wife, who was also on the cruise.
Less than 48 hours later the 74-year-old was rushed to Wollongong Hospital’s ICU where he remains on life support. Tests last Saturday confirmed he has coronavirus.
In the days that followed his admission, his four friends who cruised with him, one by one tested positive.
His wife is already in isolation at home and can’t visit her husband — the man she has loved since she was 18.
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The decorated policeman’s daughter described COVID-19 as the enemy we can’t see coming.
“COVID-19 is marching down our street, it’s invading our homes, it’s infecting our families, our friends, our community, our society,” she told The Sunday Telegraph.
“It has taken my father prisoner. He will be one of many. We are fighting a war against the invisible.
“Our hospitals are like those concentration camps. My dad is locked up in a room, separated from the family that loves him dearly.
“Like the concentration camps, the hospitals are overcrowded and they can’t deal with the number of people who are getting sick.
“It’s becoming an issue of life or death. The strong will live, the weak will die. The nurses, the doctors are our army, they are fighting this war against the invisible.
“They are our frontline, they are our soldiers, they are fighting to save my dad’s life and they’re fighting for all of us.”
The Wollongong mother is struggling to comprehend how her parents’ cruising holiday went so wrong.
“Then there is the Ruby Princess,” she said.
“The ship that docked and let 2700 invisible predators step into our country, in the lungs of unknowing hostages — my dad, my mum, their friends — all taken hostage.
“To me the Ruby Princess is not only a warship, but it is the modern-day Titanic, 2700 lives hanging in the balance.
“Some will survive, but others will drown … drown in the fluid building up in their lungs.
“Then I turn on the TV and I am flooded by news of people losing their jobs, of businesses closing down, of people hoarding food and emptying supermarket shelves, of financial insecurity across my country. The next Great Depression.
“This is history repeating itself, but not over a number of years. This is happening all in one day, that’s what it feels like today.”