Covid in the Community

There are currently 2 active cases of Covid-19 in Kahnawà:ke and they are in the same household. Barton Goodleaf saying that he started feeling sick last Saturday evening:

“Flags are raised in my mind that I should get tested, which we did on Monday morning. So, Sunday we just had a flu-like little symptoms, fever, aching, just a typical feeling of a regular flu and we go to get tested on Monday morning and I got my results on Tuesday.”

Goodleaf says that finding out that he was positive was and is somewhat scary:

“You realize how vulnerable you are and everyone is vulnerable to this. It’s not so much that I’m scared or was scared to have Covid, it’s the other people that are less, with compromised immune systems and things like that: older people and younger people and I understood that. So, that was my immediate thinking was that and just realizing how fragile, like I was observing with mask and distancing 6 feet and it still got to me.”

Goodleaf says that both he and his wife, Mary, had tested positive. But their 3 children have all tested negative. He says the support from the community has been overwhelming:

“It’s amazing how many people offer (a) helping hand, anything, water, people brought us, they’re offering all day long. Our phones are going off asking if we need anything, we need help, get well wishes. Through the whole community, people that we regularly don’t see on a regular basis, offering food, people dropped off medicine. It made me realize and both of us realize how fortunate we are to live in a community with resources; again, so, it’s kind of turning me to realize that something good in Covid is, it brings back a community.”