In the two years since Covid changed everything for New Yorkers, few in the city have felt the burden more than those working in health care.

“Today and the last couple of weeks seems more like pre-COVID working in this hospital,” said Erwin Yeung, “[It] seems like things are getting back to the way that they use to be.”

For registered nurses like Yeung it’s a welcome change of pace at Lenox Hill Hospital.

“I work on a medicine floor and I remember when COVID hit, we were actually the first unit to be deemed all COVID” remembered Yeung. “Everyone had respiratory issues, breathing issues, everyone was on oxygen.”

His floor was full of COVID-19 patients as recently as January, but now the latest surge is over.

“Now we’re COVID free,” Yeung said. “This unit is COVID free.”

Yeung started his career as an RN in 2019, just months before the pandemic’s first wave.

“It kind of just flipped me upside down. I wasn’t sure what to expect. No one knew what to expect.  Everything that we thought, we knew we had to relearn it,” remembered Yeung. “Everyone was scared.” 

He said it was tough working through the anxiety of the early days, standing in for family members who couldn’t be there for their loved ones’ last moments and living each day with the emotional toll and the burnout.

“It’s very sad in these situations, but you kind of had to put your feelings aside and think about the patient and think about the situation,” said Yeung, who credits the help of his fellow health care workers with getting him through it. 

While he’s seen a drop in COVID cases before, he’s optimistic that this marks a real return to normal, never once doubting his choice of profession or its timing.

“I think it was the right choice for me,” said Yeung. “You have to do it because of something that speaks out to you.”