30-Year-Old With COVID Loses Arms, Legs After Being Given Choice to Amputate Limbs or Die

Candice Davis, a generally healthy 30-year-old, is encouraging people to get vaccinated against COVID-19 so they won't have to make the decision she faced: lose your limbs or die.

Although it rarely happens, COVID-19 can result in the loss of limbs because it can affect blood flow to arms and limbs, causing the tissue to die. It's left some patients, like Davis, having to adjust to a new way of life after recovering from COVID because they had to make the hard decision to lose some or all of their limbs.

Davis, who was unvaccinated when she contracted COVID-19 in August, was on a ventilator within days and woke up three weeks later to her mother telling her she had to make a decision, according to The Philadelphia Inquirer. Because she had developed circulatory problems in her arms and legs, doctors said they had to amputate her arms if she wanted to survive.

"I said, If my arms gotta go, they gotta go," she told the Inquirer. "It's my life."

Davis, who lives in South Philadelphia, didn't have any preexisting conditions, such as diabetes, that would have made her more susceptible to losing her limbs. While the decision to amputate her arms to save her life was "sad," she said, losing her legs was more emotional because it will make being independent harder.

Vaccines are known to help reduce a person's risk of contracting COVID-19, and those who test positive for the coronavirus are less likely to get seriously ill if they're vaccinated. Davis' brother, Ali, contracted COVID-19 around the time that she did, but he had a mild case and recovered on his own.

"That's why people need to be vaccinated: My brother lost his taste and smell for a while. I lost my limbs," she told the Inquirer.

Davis isn't alone in using her experience with COVID-19 to try to prevent others from living through what she experienced.

Justin Moon, a former University of Alabama football player, was 36 when he contracted COVID-19. Generally a healthy person, Moon considered getting vaccinated but was hesitant because of rampant misinformation. As cases started to surge in the summer, he and his wife decided they'd get vaccinated but contracted COVID-19 before their appointment.

Moon spent 39 days on a ventilator and had to relearn to walk and use his right arm.

"My situation did not have to be like this. If I had not been unsure of the vaccine and got vaccinated, it would have probably gone like a lot of other stories," Justin said in an interview with the University of Alabama at Birmingham's website. "I would have had a headache, shortness of breath and just laid on the couch for a few days."

He and his wife estimate their telling their story has helped convince more than 200 people to get vaccinated.

Like Moon, Davis was hesitant to get vaccinated against COVID-19 and told the Inquirer she knows it's "scary" because "I was scared too." However, she urged people to get vaccinated because "you don't want to lose your limbs" and, more important, "you don't want to lose your life."