that. it was really hard to make it happen. you made a lot of phone calls and finally you found some space at a hospital in atlanta. and i wonder, principal smith, i know you were feeling absolutely horrible, but tell me why it was the case that you actually had to be convinced to go on a ventilator and that you would have to be relocated. what was going through your mind, what were you experiencing? i think the main thing going through my mind was the horror stories that basically once you go on the vent in the past, that that was kind of a death sentence, low chances of survival. my main thing was i wasn t ready to leave my kids and i wasn t ready to leave my wife or my students at school. i just had an overwhelming desire to live overall. well, thank goodness, because the will to live is very
meaningful in so many cases, right, dr. laney? this is personal for you, too. you re a doctor in your town, but your son actually also attends greer smith s high school. so talk to me about kind of that personal tug that you had to try and make sure he would get the best help possible. yeah, this was very personal to me. the hardest part of this pandemic, especially in this small town, typically we know just about everyone that walks through the doors. everyone in the town knows mr. smith. he s very well respected in our community. we re friends with the same people. we are both little league football coaches, so we see each other out there. my son talks very highly of mr. greer and loves him as a principal. and the er physician called me and said, hey, you need to get to the er, the principal of the
faith-centered community and we have lots of love and prayers toward my family and i m so thankful that god used dr. laney to allow me to be healed. it s nothing short of a miracle that i m here. so many people don t make it and i m very blessed that i did. and i ask anybody who is on the fence about it to go ahead and take that step and get that vaccine so that your family can have you continue your life. well, so glad you got through it, principal greer smith, and so glad that all of you embraced each other, dr. jason laney, and were able to help each other out through trying and frightening times. thank you for sharing your story with us. thank you. and despite vaccinations, breakthrough cases remain a concern. on the view yesterday moments before vice president kamala harris was about to be
together and to share this story. but it really is an example of how tough this battle is for everybody who tests positive for covid-19. so, doctor, take us through the series of events that unfolded. i gave kind of a little thumbnail sketch of what happened. but why did you feel like the only way this principal was going to get the best chance at trying to survive was to go to a hospital either in atlanta or savannah? and it ended up being in atlanta, right? correct. how did you make that determination? how did you get the wheels in motion? so mr. smith was on 100% oxygen, he was having coughing spells, oxygen levels would drop to the 70s and we were very uncomfortable how long it was taking to get back to normal, so i knew he was going to need intubation and i felt that this
to keep them alive. it plays out on a daily basis. we have a microcosm story for you right now in a small 25-bed hospital in south georgia in july, dr. jason lehny was trying to keep all of his patients alive, but one in particular caught his attention. greer smith. smith is the principal of the local high school and the father of two kids. he had become so sick with covid that the only chance the doctor had to save the principal was to get him a bed in a hospital perhaps in atlanta or even nearby savannah, georgia, where they had life-saving equipment. more than 30 patients have died of covid at the hospital and he didn t want to see any more die. but greer smith wasn t going to be one of them. that was the hope of the doctor. and, in fact, principal ygreer smith and his doctor are both with me now. so glad that you all can be