A coronavirus survivor has described his "surreal" experience of being inside a hospital 'red zone' where NHS staff loved patients like their own children.
Mac Logan, 69, had been feeling ill in the days leading up to April 1 - when his symptoms became dramatically worse.
Turning to his wife Meg, Mac, from Fife, Scotland, said he "needed help" before making calls to help lines - something he now has no recollection of as the virus had already taken grip.
After a doctor visited Mac's house to take his temperature, he found himself in the 'red zone' of Victoria Hospital within 40 minutes- wards dedicated strictly for the treatment of coronavirus patients.
As a nurse took his arm and led Mac away, he said a weak goodbye to his wife at the entrance - not knowing if they would ever see each other again.
Mac said: "My wife couldn't come any further - she described me as a frail old man being steered into the building.
"She later told me she thought she would never see me again."
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Mac went on to spend a week in hospital, saying stepping into the red zone on that first day was "surreal" before he was placed in a private room alone and later officially diagnosed with coronavirus and viral pneumonia.
Mac, being lucid and still breathing unassisted, was not placed in intensive care - but stayed on a former surgical ward - where he said nurses didn't just care for him, they "loved" him.
Speaking to the Mirror Online as he recovers at home, he said: "What is so important to stress is the quality of these NHS people and how they cared for me.
"They cared for me and they loved me like my own mother would love me. It was amazing."
The grandfather described how the staff remained loving and caring even in the most trying of circumstances - and often when faced with patients who, through the stress of the virus had become difficult to manage.
Mac added: "There was one man who was struggling and would make rude faces when offered food by staff.
"Then one day he spoke to his wife on the phone and it broke him and he cried.
"This nurse came over and just wrapped him in her arms and with her blue gloved fingers, she gently stroked the top of his hand.
"It was like a mum holding her baby."
On another occasion, Mac described how he felt an overwhelming pang of gratitude after noticing a doctor standing at his bedside was wearing protective goggles he had bought from B&Q.
Mac said: "I remember that doctor swooshed the curtain around my bed and I saw a B&Q tag on his specs.
"And I thought, 'If i sneeze right now near his face, he will get this potentially deadly disease' -but there he was caring for me without proper protection and without a second thought."
Mac was placed on a dose of antibiotics to treat his pneumonia, but after a few days says his breathing became "strangling".
He added: "The virus had me gripped. I was fighting for deeper breaths, but sometimes chickened out of taking them.
"If I dared take a deep breath in, I would then cough and splutter - it was so painful. I was coughing for Scotland."
Mac was fitted with an oxygen mask, but said it was his "mission" to keep fighting and return home to Meg.
He added: "My one thought was I have to do everything to co-operate - I had to breathe and keep my lungs working, take my oxygen, take my fluids and get home.
"There were times when I felt lonely, but I was never alone. From the moment you step into that red zone, it helps to remember every single person around you wants to get you well and home."
Being totally cut off from his family, Mac said a FaceTime with his granddaughters was allowed - a special moment during his ordeal he says he will never forget.
Mac added: "In that call to my grandchildren, I was able to laugh and smile as I heard their voices and listened to them giggle - it was so wonderful to have that human contact with people I love."
After being treated in the red zone of the hospital, Mac went on to his final stage of treatment in a men's recovery ward.
There, he describes the agony of seeing others who were not as lucky as him, as their conditions began to once again deteriorate - including one man who Mac believes did not make it.
Describing the scene as he entered that ward for the first time, Mac said: "I suspected one man may already be dead and they took him away.
"There was also a young policeman in that ward with me and I saw him in a plight of hell that I never want to see another human being go through again in my life.
"When I eventually left, I wondered if the policeman would make it, but I got his first name and I called the force he worked in and they told me he had made it home."
Exactly a week after staggering into hospital in a haze of pain and confusion, Mac was told he would be returning home to his wife.
He said walking through his front door to meet his Meg as a survivor was "incredible", adding: "Seven days after walking into the 'red zone' with a scary high fever, coronavirus and severe viral pneumonia - the woman who watched me stagger like a old man and I sat opposite each other in our home.
"We reminisced, laughed and also wept.
"We have a beautiful conservatory and I sat in my chair and just to be able to breath and know that I had made it back seven days after not being sure I was going to live was simply incredible."
Looking back on his ordeal, Mac says his time in hospital and coronavirus scare has been a "defining point" in his life - and hopes it can be a defining point for society as a whole.
Mac added: "One of the things that I will never forget is it's important to tell people you love them and why you love them.
"I could have died and I would never have said what needed to be said.
"This will be a defining time for all of us and we must take from it an understanding of how to love and accept one-another.
"Good will works."
