'It is Hell Here,' Kenyan-Born Nurse Working in the US Says over Covid-19
A Kenyan-born nurse living and working in the US has spoken about the challenges health workers are facing in the wake of the coronavirus outbreak.
Dorothy Ogega, a geriatric nurse based in Indianapolis, Indiana, shared her experience during a video interview with Citizen TV’s Jeff Koinange on Wednesday night.
Dorothy, who works an 18-hour shift, said she is constantly exposed to the virus on a daily basis and her worst fear is contracting the illness and transmitting it to her children.
"Yeah, it is hell here. It has been very challenging since we had our first case and I am very scared. Being a Kenyan and a nurse here, I am very scared,” said Dorothy.
"At the moment we have 60,000 patients and 807 deaths [in the US]. Being a geriatric, I work with the elderly and they are the most vulnerable. Their immune system is not able to contend with the virus," she added.
To make the matter worse, she said the US is running out of essential equipment including face masks and gowns and ventilators. "…We are running out of supplies and we are struggling. The US was not ready for this," the mother of three boys notes.
"My boys are grown enough so they understand but again, I am their mommy to them so I have to assure them. I have to take off my clothes in the garage, leave them there. It is not an easy thing to do.”
"Please my fellow Kenyans, let us heed to the social distancing because this virus is there," Dorothy pleads.
Comments (79)
There are no 18 hour shifts. Most is 12
I have heard of 16hrs double shift. 18hrs is live inn.
If she keeps on like this, then she needs to stay Away from her kids for now. The kids will Understand.
CoronaVirus is not killing kids
She is out for 19 hrs. 18 at work and 30min each way of her commute.
But how can she be working as a “live-in” while she has kids?? She only got 6 hrs left to cook, feed the kids and one hour to take a cat-nap! No wonder she is unloading her emotions to Jeff! Hang in there baby-gal! Nawaoooo!
I work weekend double shifts . Each shift is 8 hours x2 =16 hours. Plus a nurse has to give report and document and adds up to 18 hours or more. So yes , one can work 18 hours .
@betty - you are required to do the documentation as you attend to every patient. There is a lot of available time to do documentations within an 8 hr shift.
So, get yourself organized and plan according to complete the scheduled work within a double shift of 16 hrs. That is a lot of time if you plan your activities well.
The 2 extra hours you work is technically cheating your employer under the pretext that your are doing document. Kenyans and magendo!!! Shadiness follows you wherever you go, all over the world!
US nurses federal & state s labor laws hours is 16 hrs max/24 hrs. Charting & documentation must be completed before then unless someone lacks time management skills, is lazy or just trying to milk the clock.
It is not the number of hours which an issue here but the exposure. How do you know they have not been asked to work longer due to shortage of staff and increase of patients . stop exposing this lady as a liar . Use your common sense
Social distancing is impractical in kenya's overpopulated slums! You can pretty much hear your next door neighbor snoring! Corona shall come to pass!
Dorothy., speak for where you are and the level of preparedness that your state is encountering not same narrative ok CNN. Sounds like you work in a nursing home. I don’t expect your facility to take care of any COVID cases. You are at the bottom of that list so you shouldn’t be running your mouth. 18 hours is worrisome to me. Infact I am not sure what labor laws in US support that. Secondly I am not sure if you have any sought of permission unless you are in media relations at your facility to be it’s spoke persons. Thirdly your state is employment at will state., if the risk supersedes the benefit., join the line with unemployment. I hate for people who keep talking about issues just to seek relevance. So the best you can and you didn’t have to call Kenya to be on news. I guess you being Luo is given. I am too but don’t feel need to call Jeff what will he do ? Nonsense
Oh Lordy, easy on our sister bwana ha ha
Omosh, what does her ethnicity have to do with anything????
She just exposed her employer to investigations by the state med board. The government will question 18 hr work schedule anywhere in America. The issues she has discussed here with Jeff should be discussed with her employer.
This Larry Midowo’s sister seems to have some issues with the truth; and that is what will get her in a huge trouble to a point of losing her nursing license! Go figure big head!!
You were saying the right stuff until you turned tribal. Bure tu!
@mike - How did he turn tribal while he says he is a Luo too! He just confirmed the exaggerations; and said he does not like it either.
@Omosh be sensible and leave her alone. cant you guys try to figure out how to help each other instead of attack . what is the deal here to attack someone who is only expressing her experience. whether she is a cleaner of doctor she did not get money from Jeff . we are free to express our selves they way we want . let those kenyan doctors come and they will be put on the front line like they do in the army foreign solders workig for usa . shame on you all who care if about hours and not about safety
@Omosh; Ogega is a Kisii name so leave Luos alone on this one.
@ Dorothy, My suggestion is that you reduce your workload because being tired puts people at the risk of being less careful thus being at a higher risk of being contaminated. If you get contaminated by that virus, your health and the health of your patients will be at a higher risk. The money you are running after won't be as sweet as you assume if you get COVID-19. It's better to do your one shift per day and go chill with your kids. Too much work reduces your productivity and your immunity.
I went by the Emergency room in a Yale University emergency room and you have to sign up with your health insurance to get a goddamn face mask.
So much for the land of opportunities
What is a geriatric nurse working 18 hours for? The ER Nurses are the once working long hours dealing with Corona. Wacha uongo, unless you work as a live in nunny, I doubt if there is a hospital that allows employees to do more than 16 hrs.
Don’t worry! We just gonna assume she works as a live-in nanny nurse where the kids go to work with her. Life in America can be tough; you know! And she may also be exaggerating to make Jeff pull the pin on the fire extinguisher - smoking, smoking, and smoking! - oh my oh my; it is very hot in here!
Roel umeichekesha kweli hahaha!
Roel umenichekesha kweli. Hahaha!
This @roel caused me to laugh stupid too! I’m still 😂 laughing for how comical he has surely analyzed Jeff with his smoking, smoking, and smoking!!
I watched this throughout as Dorothy gave all the stories about being a nurse in the US. I am a nurse, trained and worked in the US for over 5yrs before I called it quits and returned to Ke. First of all, Dorothy, you don’t become a geriatric nurse by working in a nursing home. Second, if you pick up the typical Kenyan way double doubles in a nursing home don’t come to tell us on a national tv that you work 18 hrs a day. That was a waste of our airtime and a let down from both Jeff and citizen tv. For your info, no hard feelings....I am nurse lecturer with a PhD so don’t think I’m jealous or anything. I just couldn’t fathom all the lies from you. The situation is bad for sure but speak facts. Very soon your employer will catch up with you. Next time please tell the media house to look for a real nurse working in a real hosp and taking care of real covid pts. For now, sorry... I know you are an lpn in a nursing home in IN. That’s the end of my Rant
@phd-nurse-lecturer cum ex-diaspora: it sounds like you are the one who should have gone on Jeff TV! You are ranting a little too much while you couldn’t hang as a nurse in America - should we call you lazy? Or you want to tell us the call for national building forced to return home? Don’t lie! Any nurse working in any environment is at risk of getting the coronavirus. Your fellow nurse on Jeff TV just gave her version of what she thought could happen in her work place. You can go on Jeff TV and rant more about your nurse PhD! And don’t go there to conduct a world class bragidaiso! We will tune you out!
hahahaha. Let me go laugh laugh kama mjinga. too hilarious!!
Wow, some of the comments here just make anybody burst in a wide range laughter! Coronavirus ghost have brought both tears and laughter alike! It is therapeutic to 😂 laugh! Hi Jeff, it is smoking in this page - just pull the pin on the fire extinguish. You need to invite Dorothy and the PhD lecturer nurse together, one more time so we can all laugh!!!
Phewww... I’m only here to read comments, but truth be told. When guys go to manjuu let them not tell lies to seek sympathy. 18 hours? Nope, covid pts in a nursing home? Nope. Geriatric nurse? Nope. Simply tell Jeff that you’ve picked up 16 straight hours so that you can make more money the Kenyan way. comeon Dorothy... cooooome on
Kenyans na ma-titles jameni! So you have a PhD and she has an LPN, so what? Get some manners, you feeling bad she was interviewed and you were not? Your Pulling Her Down (PHD) is inconsequential
@phd-guru, thanks for faintly advertising yourself as you cut down on an lpn who is working so hard to feed her family in a very tough situation. The coronavirus does not recognize titles ( your PhD, lecturer, and a new kid in the halls of lecturing nurses) are concerned! One would expect that a Nurse with a PhD would be more sympathetic with a junior nurse in the work that she does. Stop dropping your trousers in the public arena and bending over your rear end to moon others simply because you have a bought PhD. Put your house in order and grow up to a level of a PhD lecturer. Stop cutting other down - we have had enough of your kind worldwide. Stop 🛑 it lecturer PhD girly!
@phd - yes you are very jealous of Dorothy! And mark you, you ain’t the first nurse lecturer with a PhD in the world! Do your job quietly and let others do the same. Stop propping yourself and probably you don’t even know anything about being a nurse - it sounds like it from your faint arrogance here!!!
@returnee - why don’t you join the Kenya Army and become a General? That who Uhuru is hiring because the PhD holders like have failed the country with corruption, glorifying yourselves, stealing, etc. Maybe as a General Kenyans will listen to your arrogance as you claim how many you killed in Kisimayu! Get down the high horses!
Dorothy looks so happy to be on Jeff Koinange Live! She does not look like she is in HELL any more. Hi Jeff, please invite Dorothy and the nurse lecturer to doke it out in your show. It surely will make some good TV comedy to your audience! Just suggesting Jeff!!!?
Stop it Dorothy!!! You work at a nursing home and you claim to be exposed???! Wacha kutudanganya wewee!!!
There have been some nursing homes that were very hard hit especially in Upstate NY.
@precious - coronavirus started in a nursing home in the state of Washington. Having a pretty name doesn’t mean that you are well learned! A well rounded citizen (mentally) does her research well before underrating others. Sad!
Corona crossed the border from the infected Chinese that have done taken over Vancouver
Oh well, lessons well learned! Them guys are the same folks beating Kenyans in the buttocks while they have put the entire world at a standstill with a crazy pandemic!!!
@Magy! Thank you for noticing my pretty name. I am actually a nurse so yes I'd call myself learned! She relays the experience of an E.R nurse. At the nursing home patients with symptoms have to be sent out to the hospitals for obvious reasons. Evidence based!
“Learned” is for the crooked lawyers, the so called “learned friends”! @precious, you are just a well educated dame worth the ears and eyes of a tall and handsome Maasai Moraan! I roar like a he lion! I build the hut, you pay the dowry!
@Magy! Thank you for noticing my pretty name. I am actually a nurse so yes I'd call myself learned! She relays the experience of an E.R nurse. At the nursing home patients with symptoms have to be sent out to the hospitals for obvious reasons. Evidence based!
@precious - Oh, pretty name nurse!!! Cute! Well, one precious sweetie would do me just right! Hope you work 18 hrs too!
@Precious, good that she is working in a nursing home. They abandoned a nursing home in Spain. So many elderly people died there and others were found still alive in their bed.
Lpn
She never said she was a nurse PhD lecturer! So, a nurse is a nurse; even one with a nurse PhD lecturer stuff! I think you are very jealous of this Lpn! Are you??
I don't envy her but it sounds like she is getting overtime by the bucketful per Indiana labor laws.
Hospitals and residential care facilities may enter into an agreement with employees for a work period of 14 consecutive days instead of 7 consecutive days. However, the employee must be paid no less than 1.5 times the regular rate for employment in excess of 8 hours in a workday or 80 hours in that 14-day period (IN Code Sec. 22-2-2-4).
I see someone who was hungry for attention. She is an attention seeker or attention whores. What a bunch of baloney?
Are you saying all nurses are whores, attention seekers, and they all eat baloney meat; you included? Wow, good to know - this is really smoking!!!