For one coronavirus patient in Wuhan, the central Chinese location where the virus outbreak first emerged, the journey from infection to recovery was a nightmare scenario that entailed multiple hospital visits, symptoms so severe he thought he would die and quarantine under police watch.
"Tiger Ye" — not his real name — is a 21-year-old student in Wuhan, the city where the new, little-understood virus was first identified. Ye, who doesn't want to be identified for fear of being ostracized, first suspected he had caught the illness on Jan. 21, when he felt too weak to finish dinner. He checked his temperature, and it was up.
At the time, little was known about the virus now known as COVID-19, but paranoia was rapidly building after authorities confirmed the highly contagious pathogen was spreading between humans in the city of 11 million. It was midnight when Ye arrived at Wuhan's top-tier Tongji Hospital to see a waiting room filled with people like him. Feverish, he knew he would have to wait hours to be tested.