Clovis twins were hospitalized with COVID-19. Now they wish they had been vaccinated
Identical twins Sean and Shane Harrell have shared a lot together in their 47 years.
It’s usually positive, like working together as mechanics at their family-owned business in Clovis. But recently, something they shared came close to ending their brotherhood: COVID-19.
Neither had received a COVID-19 vaccine before they were hospitalized with coronavirus last month at Community Regional Medical Center in Fresno.
Shane described previously feeling indifferent about the vaccine. Sean had called himself an “anti-vaxxer.” The brothers’ perspectives about that have changed.
“Everyone says my body, my choice. I was the same way,” Sean said Monday, on their 47th birthday. “But if I could go back in time, I would choose differently because of everything my family and I went through. I personally suggest everyone who can safely get vaccinated do so.”
One didn’t know he needed more oxygen and help breathing
Sean was at CRMC for nearly a month because of coronavirus, from Aug. 7 to Sept. 2. He suffered a stroke from COVID-19 and was on a ventilator in the intensive care unit, Community Medical Centers shared.
Shane was in the hospital for a week, admitted a few days after his brother.
They think Sean contracted the virus first. Sean started feeling sick after a trip to Las Vegas with his wife, who also got coronavirus but wasn’t hospitalized.
The brothers were admitted into the hospital after their oxygen levels dropped to dangerous levels.
“I had a COVID pneumonia but no breathing issues at home. That was what was so scary!” Shane said. “If it wasn’t for my wife insisting on checking my oxygen saturation while I was sick, I would have never known I was hypoxic and needed help breathing.
“Once I went to the hospital and got oxygen, the fog I was in started to lift. I still have no memory of the first week or so at home when my only symptoms were fever, body aches, and loss of taste.”
Hypoxia is when the body sustains damage from not getting enough oxygen.
His brother had it worse. Sean having to fight for his life in the ICU was “probably the worst thing that I’ve ever seen,” Shane said tearfully during a Community Medical Centers’ interview.
“Once I was told that I had been close to dying but that I was OK,” Sean said, recalling his hospital stay. “I felt a calmness and sense of relief that I was past the bad part. Everyone told me to keep fighting, and that’s what I did.”
Promoting COVID-19 vaccines to help themselves and others
The brothers are very happy to be back home now with their families. Shane said he’s shocked how much muscle he lost from being bedridden for just a couple weeks, and Sean is learning how to walk again following his month-long hospital stay.
COVID-19 cases have risen dramatically in recent weeks throughout the central San Joaquin Valley. The state on Friday issued a new hospital surge order in response to dwindling ICU beds in the Valley.
“I’m happy because I get to live another day,” Shane said, “but at the same time it saddens me, knowing that there are so many other COVID patients that won’t.”
They want to get a COVID-19 shot as soon as they’re able to, to protect themselves and others.
“A lot of people are like, ‘Oh, it’s no big deal. It’s just a cold. I had a cough.’ Well that’s fine. That was you,” Shane said of COVID-19. “But there’s other people that wish they had a cough. They died.”
