Credit: Justin Rex for The Texas Tribune
When Amy Jones burst through the doors of the intensive care unit, she found a line of health care workers in the hallway, she said. Jones was sobbing. Shaking. She let out a scream.
A doctor named Juan Fitz was dying.
Fitz, 67, was Jonesâ longtime romantic partner and the father of her two young kids. To his co-workers, he was a revered colleague in the emergency department at Lubbockâs Covenant Medical Center, where he had worked for roughly two decades.
Fitz had driven himself to the hospital in the early hours of the morning four weeks before, after testing positive for COVID-19. Though his oxygen levels had dropped, he seemed optimistic. He told Jones heâd be better soon.