Covid: Aberdare woman, 22, lost her hair and thought she would die

A woman left terrified when she caught Covid at 22 said she thought she was going to die.

Ffion Barnett, of Aberdare, Rhondda Cynon Taf, was so ill she was put in an induced coma for five days.

She lost her hair and had to learn to walk again after testing positive two days after her birthday in August.

Ms Barnett, who works as a waitress, had not been vaccinated and still thinks people should make the "best choice that's personal to them".

She has since been vaccinated herself.

When she fell ill she had no underlying health conditions.

Within days she was struggling to breathe and was admitted to the Royal Glamorgan hospital.

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"It's scary, and you do think you are going to die when you can't breathe, and the machines around you are beeping," she said.

After going into intensive care she was put into a coma.

Ms Barnett said: "Because my heart rate was too high, it was like 180 and I was at risk of cardiac arrest, they said, 'Right we're going to have to put her under'."

"So they took the breathing away for me.

"I was on 100% oxygen at that time because I was breathing so hard. I was in the coma for five days."

Ffion Barnett was so ill she was put in an induced coma for five days

When she was brought back around Ms Barnett had to learn to walk again.

She then returned home to her family where she needed round-the-clock care.

"I had to have people there to make me food and all that sort of stuff so my family took it in shifts," Ms Barnett said.

"It took a month-and-a-half to get back to walking normally without feeling like I had weights on my legs.

"And psychologically I started to get better from then, with help from counsellors."

When Ms Barnett, who works in Cardiff, became sick her hair fell out. It has only recently started to grow back properly.

"It's starting to grow back now luckily but it was insane because I had long thick hair and it just kept coming out," she said.

Fatigue has been a lasting effect.

"It doesn't seem to be getting better either," she said.

When she became ill Ms Barnett had not decided whether she would get vaccinated, though she had been invited to.

Ffion Barnett lost her hair when she became ill

"I was called up to have my vaccine and I was still making my decision on it at the time," she said.

"While I was in that thought process, I caught Covid. I was actually leaning towards having the vaccine anyway, but I caught Covid, and it was just really bad timing."

Ms Barnett wants young people to understand how hard they can be hit by Covid.

"They can get it quite severely," she said.

"While my organs weren't failing it still wasn't a nice thing to go through, and hopefully people can avoid that by wearing their masks or getting jabbed.

"People need to make their own choice, and work through each and every argument if they don't want to get vaxxed, and see it from both sides."

People, she believed, should "stay away from being biased by one side or the other".

"I think people need to look at all the facts and just decide what's best for them," she said.

Ms Barnett said she could understand why some people were reluctant to be vaccinated.

"People are just ultimately scared," she said.

"I think they should consider both sides of the argument and make that best choice that's personal to them," she said.

It's a long way from what it was before she caught coronavirus

Describing herself as "vulnerable", she said she was now vaccinated.

"There's nothing else out there to protect yourself with so its the only way I feel a little bit safer I suppose," she said.

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