Coronavirus Update: COVID-19 Survivor Chronicles Journey On Twitter, Saying 'I'm So Thankful To Be Alive'
NEW YORK (CBSNewYork) -- In this pandemic, there have been stories about heartbreak, but there's also hope.
Legal recruiter David Lat still has a long road to recovery, but it pales to the near-death journey that brought him to this moment.
"I've been out of the hospital for a week, a little more than a week," he told CBS2's Aundrea Cline-Thomas.
Lat spent 17 days fighting COVID-19 at NYU Langone Medical Center.
Six of those days were spent on a ventilator.
"I get winded very easily. I walk across a room or up a flight of stairs, so I just need to take it easy. My voice, as you can hear, is still hoarse from the time on the ventilator," Lat said.
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Lat began having symptoms on March 7, when there were still just a few dozen coronavirus cases in the city.
He couldn't initially get a test.
At 44 years old, he didn't smoke, rarely drank and was considered pretty healthy. His only underlying condition is exercise-induced asthma.
"I use an inhaler when I go running. I completed the New York Marathon twice, so obviously it hasn't stopped me that much," he said.
Lat was admitted after returning to the hospital when he was unable to breathe.
He shared his diagnosis online as a warning to others.
"I wanted people who had come into contact with me to know, in case they started getting symptoms and wanted to get tested," Lat said.
But after receiving overwhelming support, Lat continued to chronicle his journey from his hospital bed, using the hashtag #LatsCovid19Journal.
It quickly gained traction on Twitter.
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On March 17, he called his experience hell, saying, "I have never been this sick in my entire life."
Days later, he was on a ventilator. Doctors used a number of experimental treatments.
"How are you processing it? A lot happened in a very short amount of time," Cline-Thomas said.
"I'm so thankful to be alive. The survival rates of ventilated patients are not great," Lat said.
Lat continues to write about his ordeal and talks about it with his husband, Zach, and other family members, which he says helps.
Now, he's looking forward to his birthday in June.
"If it's safe to get together again in June, I want to have a really big party to get together with all of my friends and family who helped me through this," Lat said.
This year, there's so much more to celebrate.
