Originally from Cuba, 50-year-old Oscar Mendez first moved to New York when he was a teenager over 30 years ago, and has lived in the city off and on ever since. He is the cofounder of New Majority Ready, a business strategy and marketing consulting company that specializes in helping companies realize the power of multicultural customers.
He currently lives in an apartment near Union Square in lower Manhattan, an area of the country that has been particularly hard-hit by the coronavirus pandemic.
Mendez has been closely following the latest updates about the pandemic, including the recent rollouts of antibody tests which show that one in five New York City residents are testing positive for coronavirus antibodies, indicating that they may have unknowingly been infected many weeks ago and have since recovered.
Mendez had experienced minor colds in early March, but showed no other symptoms. Still, living in such a high-risk area and knowing of several people who had gotten sick, he wondered if he had maybe contracted the virus unknowingly, and been asymptomatic. With his 76-year-old mother coming to stay with him from his brother's home in New Jersey in mid-May, Mendez wanted to take every precaution possible for her safety.
On Monday, April 27, Mendez learned that CityMD Urgent Care would begin offering antibody tests the following day. He arrived to the location closest to him at 8 a.m. on Tuesday, and was greeted by a line down the street of fellow New Yorkers, each equally eager to get tested.
This is his experience, as told to Laura Casado.
Read the original article on Business Insider