Washington, D.C. Newsroom, May 7, 2020 / 09:48 am
A Catholic nurse said the coronavirus pandemic has presented challenges she has never encountered before-and that a prayer life is critical to get her through her shift.
"If I don't have my faith in me, I cannot give what I don't have," said Maria Arvonio, a registered nurse for almost 40 years and a board member of the National Association of Catholic Nurses.
As the current night shift supervisor at Virtua Willingboro Medical Center in southern New Jersey-a COVID-19 "hot spot," she says-Arvonio told CNA she and her colleagues were facing a new kind of disease.
Over the decades she has had experience treating previous diseases including the AIDS epidemic, before which nurses didn't wear gloves. "I'm still standing-that is God," she said.