Gwinnett County

Gwinnett man reflects after spending the last year recovering from COVID-19

GWINNETT COUNTY, Ga. — The road to recovery has been a long one for a Gwinnett County man.

A year ago, Michael Mullinix couldn’t walk and could barely talk after a battle with COVID-19 left him in the hospital for a month and nearly killed him.

“I just want to get the vaccine so I won’t get COVID anymore,” Michael told Channel 2′s Tony Thomas. When Thomas asked if he was still worried about COVID, he replied affirmatively, saying he was “kind of worried.”

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When he was released from the hospital just over a year ago, doctors and nurses lined the exit as he went home, celebrating him as a success story.

After months of rehab and work, Michael is now walking on his own, and his voice is back with the help of his cat.

“When she would meow, I’d call her name and stuff, that’s how I got my voice back. That’s how it slowly came back,” he said.

“Seeing him walk now and talk, I’m very happy that he is here now. It took awhile for him to recover,” his mother, Connie Mullinix, said.

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Connie Mullinix said it took four to five months for everything to start coming back for her son, but now he is almost back to normal as cases begin to increase again.

Latest statistics from the Gwinnett County Department of Public Health shows COVID-19 cases ticking back up, sitting at 116 last Monday.

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A year to the day after being released from the hospital, Michael went back to see the doctors and nurses who treated him. This time he was able to walk out of the hospital.

Michael says the only impact he has left from the virus is a bad ankle that hurts when he uses it a lot.