He felt in great shape. Yet at 51, the deputy for Charente-Maritime Raphaël Gérard came close to death because of the Covid-19. He had six weeks of chaotic hospitalization. "I am a survivor," he breathes today, when he has finally been able to return home. His tired and emaciated face still bears the mark of a pressure ulcer, a vestige of the long hours spent in the prone position in intensive care.
It all started in the National Assembly, with a simple cough on Thursday March 5, before its temperature climbed in stages, up to 40 ° C, the following days. The elected LREM of Jonzac had just found refuge in Cantal where he has an isolated second home. “I ended up calling Samu on Wednesday. The Aurillac hospital kept me: the PCR test was positive for Covid-19. I had chills, tremors. Afterwards, everything becomes blurred, ”recalls Raphaël Gérard, who will be taken to intensive care two days later.
Intubated, connected to an artificial respirator, he is plunged into a coma for 12 days, treated among other things with chloroquine. "The prognosis was very poor, with great uncertainty," he explains. When he wakes up, Raphaël Gérard shows himself very agitated, "incapable of discerning the true from the false, plunged in anxiety and an impressive paranoid delirium".
"I had to relearn balance"
The 50-year-old cannot speak or even write: "The caregivers gave me a slate, I was tracing an infamous porridge ..." In full health, he had never been hospitalized before. "Not for a second, I imagined it would go that far. When I arrived at the hospital, I thought of paracetamol and medical support, not of resuscitation. I did not see this changeover happen, ”confides the elected official.
Transferred to a private clinic until Easter, Raphaël Gérard still struggles step by step and suffers "a second shock: my legs were no longer carrying me ... I had to relearn balance, movements. Today, I am still very weak but I walk without a cane ”. The chosen one, who quickly runs out of steam and has not found his voice, lost 15 kg but not the taste or the smell. "I don't have any heart complications either, but I have trouble concentrating, reading and completing a simple article. This disease is very violent, it changes the way we look at life. I may have had a second chance… ”
"I don't want to be a risk to others"
His caregivers, Raphaël Gérard thank them very much: “They take risks for themselves and their families. I haven't even seen a single one of their faces. On April 17, the MP returned to his second home where he must observe a strict fortnight. He worries about his relatives: "They wear a mask but I tested negative on Covid-19 after resuscitation, then again positive ten days later. This is one of the mysteries of this disease. And no test is planned for my entourage, I do not want to be a risk for others. "
Raphaël Gérard does not know when he will be able to sit in the National Assembly again. "It will depend on my ability to move independently. First I will focus on my rest and my riding, ”he says. The pandemic and its hospitalization are shaking up the eyes of this elected LREM. “There will inevitably be a third act in the quinquennium. We must get out of budgetary dogmatism and free up resources for those who are today on the front line. Many of them are struggling and earning the minimum wage. That raises questions ”, estimates Raphaël Gérard who intends to make it his“ fight ”.
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