Who Will Look After My Kids If I Get Sick?

Fear during Coronavirus goes beyond concerns about food security and health risks.  Parents are terrified about what would happen to their children if they were to get sick.

Betty, a widow with three kids, says “I watch the news every day, and I’m here thinking so many things and I’m worried. When I learned that someone I knew died, I felt very scared. Three people I know have already died [from coronavirus].” She especially worries about her children because she’s estranged from her extended family and has no one else who could take care of her children if she got sick: “I tell my children, I only have them and they only have me. And if something happens to me, they would become orphans. I don’t want anything to happen to them. I don't want to lose a loved one again. You go outside with fear. I only go outside if I need something.

Nicole is a Caribbean immigrant and single mother of three. She has been struggling with the anxiety of unemployment, making rent, and taking care of three girls in a two-bedroom apartment. One of her biggest concerns though, is the risk of contracting COVID. She has taken precautions to minimize that risk - mask and gloves, sanitizing surfaces, not visiting family - but worries that illness for her is uncertainty for her daughters. “I can’t imagine...me getting ill,” she said, “I don’t know what would happen to the kids. I don’t know who would help me.”

Names and some details changed to preserve confidentiality