She was a legendary rural health nurse in the Belize River Valley, in fact, Bernadette Smith Flowers had become synonymous with her job, she was simply known as "Ms Nurse."
But, the career rural health nurse lost her battle with COVID 19 last night, and becomes the first nurse to die of the disease. Smith Flowers was a retired nurse who came back to the profession to help cover for the nursing shortage.
Her death now has devastated her family and sent a shock to the community of nurses. This evening we spoke with President of the Nurses Association, Darrell Spencer about the significance of her loss:
Darrell Spencer, President, Nurses Association
"The department will surely miss her. She has been a rural health nurse, a pillar of the Double Head Cabbage community since 1990, so I would be sure to say that the community of Double Head Cabbage will surely miss her, because this is a person that they have been seeing helping them and like these older nurses, we older staff going way above and beyond the call of duty to make sure all her patients are well tended to. She was well loved by her community and of course by her family and the nursing profession. It is a trained behavior in nursing in Belizean nurses where we want to continue until we cannot anymore and this Nurse Smith Flowers is one of those persons. She had been treated at the Karl Heusner Memorial Hospital for over a week in the ICU, so we knew that she was sick for a little while, of course we always hoped that things would turn out for the best and this instance, sadly it didn't. It is an awakening for those of us that are still here for the mere fact that we are exposed to all sorts of diseases and illnesses, stresses, financial burdens, so the immunity of one of the frontline healthcare professionals. If we were to do a scientific study or research, the immunity of us would tend to be a little bit lower than the average Joe, because of all these things. Now, we are always exposed to all sorts of myriad of infection and diseases, so to add something like Covid to that, obviously it have some significant bearing on our presence here and I know that this will wake up quite a bit more of personnel, the healthcare providers all over, not just nurses."
Former Belize Rural North Area Rep Edmond Castro also has fond memories of the lady they called "Ms Nurse". He told us about her contribution:
Edmond Castro, Former Area Representative
"Most people in the River Valley know Nurse. I use to refer to her as River Valley Nurse, because she use to take care of everybody in the area and a lot of people might not even know her real name is Bernadette. She went to live and work in the Belize River Valley area for some 30 plus years and she worked there until she retired maybe a couple years ago and she was asked to come back because of this covid situation, come back to assist with the corona cases especially in that part of the country."
Reporter
"So called back to duty, She was under no obligation to get back on the frontlines and fight a pandemic, was she?"
Edmond Castro, Former Area Representative
"None whatsoever, but that's all her life. All her life she has been a nurse and a midwife, so when was asked to come and assist her community, she gladly took up back that challenge to assist the community that she dearly loved, that she has served for over 30 years. So, she went back and that was the result of in the line of her work, she contracted that deadly virus."
Reporter
"Did you know her at a personal level?"
Edmond Castro, Former Area Representative
"Yes, she was very friendly to everyone. A lot of the people there 30 years and in their 20s she delivered them and she also had a women's group or a charity group that use to deal with raising funds and assist people in the area with food basket during this crisis. She was very helpful. The people in the entire Belize River Valley will surely miss her and miss being around her. She was a friendly person and she has always been a community-spirited person and so myself, I know of her and always when you go to Double Head I would stop and hollered for nurse, because everybody called her Nurse, she was retired and she was still Nurse. She was a wonderful human being."
Her family in Double Head Cabbage - deeply wounded by her loss - declined comment today:
