'Like a war zone': Michigan ICU nurse breaks down after 13-hour shift

An intensive care unit (ICU) nurse from southeast Michigan shared a tearful plea after a long shift treating critical coronavirus patients, sharing the brutal reality of fighting the pandemic on the front lines.

Registered nurse Melissa Steiner recorded this public plea after her first shift in the newly-designated COVID-19 ICU at her hospital, saying it was “traumatic.”

“I don’t know what the f**k just happened,” Steiner says, before tearfully describing how she spent 13 hours caring for two critically ill patients while being isolated from her team, and with “limited resources, limited supplies, limited responses from physicians because they’re just as overwhelmed.”

“This is my new normal for the next however many months it takes for this virus to die down,” she says. “I’m already breakingplease take this seriously.”

As of Wednesday afternoon, Michigan reported 2,856 confirmed cases of coronavirus and 60 deaths, according to local media.