Stress of serving on COVID frontlines led to EMT's suicide, mother says

When the coronavirus was rapidly spreading across the U.S. in April and May last year, paramedics in New York City on the frontlines of the pandemic responded to more than 7,000 calls a day. The calls kept coming, and EMTs kept answering.

What those EMTs saw is tough to shake. "You never had time to think," said deputy chief A.J. Briones, of Empress Ambulance Services in Yonkers, N.Y. "Once it started slowing down, that's when you actually had to worry." Worry, he said, about the toll on paramedics' mental health. "PTSD is a rabbit hole; you get angry for no reason, you lose who you are. Part of it feels like you're being a burden to someone else. Part of it is reliving those moments," he told correspondent Mola Lenghi.