Temitope

Age at interview: 41 years
Gender: Male
Background: Temitope is 41 years old and is Black African. He is an IT service manager and lives with his wife and daughter. Temitope did not think he had Covid because he did not experience a high temperature. However, his friend encouraged him to take a test which came back positive. This surprised Temitope.

Temitope’s remembers having a cough and thinking it was a normal cold. So, he went to the pharmacy for some cough syrup. The pharmacist took his temperature and said that most likely, it’s not the Covid Temitope agreed and treated his cough with the syrup and lemon.

A friend of Temitope’s told him that he should do a Covid test. He thought that this would put his mind at rest. Temitope felt confident about the test because he thought that he did not have Covid. So, when he opened the text that told him that he had Covid he was surprised. However, he also says that by the time he had his test results he was starting to have a temperature and a headache.

Temitope told his wife that he had Covid, but did not tell his daughter. He thought it was best she did not know considering she was quite young (nine years old). Temitope and his wife decided to stay at home, and got in touch with friends so that they could deliver food and other necessities.

Temitope remembers receiving a letter asking him to fill in an online form so that they could track his symptoms and text people who had been in close contact with him. But, he had not been in close contact with anyone but his wife and daughter. This confused him as he did not know how he caught Covid.

Temitope didn’t want to take the garlic ‘concoction’ because it wasn’t recommended by a doctor.

Age at interview 41

Many people mentioned garlic and this, I don’t even know what to call it, a concoction, where you mix garlic and turmeric and blend it until it gets, because I said it’s not recommended by the doctor, so I’m not taking it.

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Temitope first thought Covid was transmitted through touch, but later learnt that the virus passed through the air.

Age at interview 41

It was a bit confusing then. Before, I think when it first came in, I thought it was by touching, never knew it could be spread by air, I just thought it was more or less touching, so you need so, no handshakes, then you need to just put, use hand sanitiser. Then later, we knew that we heard it going, Covid passed through air. Then later we were told that it could actually stay in air for a number of hours or so then it will have, maybe somebody has passed some minutes or hours and you passed it so yeah, the ways that which you could catch it was a bit confusing and again, that also, I understood that, because it’s a new virus, everyone is trying to investigate so there’s a probability that we might get things wrong. I mean the scientists, the government might get things wrong, and they will keep trying until they get it right, so I wasn’t really bothered. That’s why I stayed indoors.

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