A Florida woman who was hospitalized with COVID-19 returned home to find her husband dead of the disease

• A Florida woman who was hospitalized with COVID-19 returned home to find her husband dead of the disease.
• Lisa Steadman battled a severe case of the disease while her husband Ronald dealt with a case at home.
• When Steadman returned home, she found her husband decomposing in bed.

A Florida woman who was hospitalized with a severe case of COVID-19 returned home after receiving treatment to find her husband dead of the disease.

Lisa Steadman, a 58-year-old nail technician from Winter Haven, Florida, told The Washington Post her husband, Ronald, was the first to test positive for the disease on August 1.

Ronald, a 55-year-old mechanical and electrical engineer, was diagnosed at an urgent care. He was sent home with medications and told to return if his condition worsened, Steadman told the Post. She was diagnosed two days later at a hospital when she began having symptoms of COVID-19, she told the newspaper.

But days later she lost consciousness at home and her oxygen levels dropped below 80%, so she returned to the hospital and was admitted, while her husband remained at home to recover.

Both Steadman and her husband were unvaccinated against the disease.

"Both of us thought that [the vaccine] came out so fast. How could they have done so much testing on it? I was just cautious about it," she told the outlet. "It's not that I was against vaccines."

While breakthrough infections can occur, COVID-19 vaccines are effective in staving off serious illness and death, even as the more contagious Delta variant fuels a surge of the disease across the US. Steadman told the outlet she planned to get vaccinated in September.

According to data from the Florida Department of Health, just over half of all Florida residents are fully vaccinated against COVID-19. About 68% of state residents have been at least partially vaccinated against the disease, according to state data.

While she was in the hospital, Steadman said she remained in contact with her husband. The couple talked about their three dogs and their family, according to the Post. After about a week after she was hospitalized, Steadman said her condition began to improve.

Ronald told her that he was improving too, she said. Days before she was expected to leave the hospital, her husband stopped answering his phone - he said he was having problems with it, she told the Post. On one occasion when he didn't answer his phone, she called the local police for a wellness check.

Officers went to the home and confirmed that Ronald was okay, the Post reported. When her call went to his voicemail on August 10, she wasn't concerned, she told the outlet.

But when she returned home the following day, she couldn't find her husband. Eventually, she found him lying in their bed. She told the Post that it looked like her dogs had not been fed in days, and said her husband had already begun to decompose.

"I just went hysterical," Steadman told the Post. "It was like walking into a horror movie. That's what I see now when I think of him."