Football

Hugh Pat McGeary finally feeling safer after Covid-19 vaccine

Tyrone's Hugh Pat McGeary (left) is setting his sights on Ulster Championship action this summer. Picture Margaret McLaughlin
Tyrone's Hugh Pat McGeary (left) is setting his sights on Ulster Championship action this summer. Picture Margaret McLaughlin Tyrone's Hugh Pat McGeary (left) is setting his sights on Ulster Championship action this summer. Picture Margaret McLaughlin

Tyrone footballer Hugh Pat McGeary finally feels safe after receiving the Covid-19 vaccine.

A diabetic who works in a hospital, he faces into the 2021 season with a measure of confidence, having diminished a vulnerability that threatened his involvement.

The 28-year-old plays a key role in keeping essential services running at Belfast’s Royal Victoria Hospital.

A mechanical engineer with the firm responsible for maintenance at one of the North’s largest acute health care facilities, McGeary now travels to work relieved of the dread that accompanied him on the daily journey for the past ten months.

“It will help me fight it. I have always been told to be careful with the Covid because of the diabetes,” he said.

“I have been one of the lucky ones, to get it so early.

“Being a diabetic, and also working in the Royal is fortunate enough too.

“I know I would have been high up on the list anyway to get it, but I’m happy to have got it.

“It does give you that bit of extra confidence to go out there and do what you can do, and that bit of confidence that you won’t be spreading it, if you did have it.”

The early days of the pandemic wrought fear on the Pomeroy clubman as he set off each morning on the 50-odd mile drive to Belfast.

Lockdown had removed virtually all life from the high way sand byways, and uncertainty filled an air potentially polluted by a deadly virus.

“At the start it was a bit scary, I’m not going to lie,” he reflected.

“Driving down to work in the very first lockdown, you didn’t know what to expect.

“I remember driving down to Belfast, and you would have been lucky to meet one vehicle on the road.

“It was like an apocalyptic event back then, that’s what you were dealing with.”

All the tricks of the defensive trade learnt over the years as a Tyrone corner back were irrelevant. Now it was the defences provided by the immune system that meant everything.

“I kept in good touch with Damien O’Donnell, my doctor, and the big thing for me was keeping my immune system right and keeping the vitamins high to help the body to fight it.

“It is difficult, especially when you’re working in the Royal, where it was rampant at one stage. We know the NHS is under pressure as it is.”

McGeary sees little merit in a rapid testing programme for inter-county GAA players as a tool in accelerating the start of the 2021 season.

“If you did the test on a Thursday night and came back in the Sunday, it wouldn’t be workable.

“Unless they could do fast testing at the pitch, where you could know there and then if you were negative or positive, before you go out and train.

“And the NHS is under enough pressure with testing and all other things.

“I think the last thing the NHS would need is elite sportsmen pulling the testing facilities away from the hospitals.

“At the end of the day, I don’t think it’s required to get the GAA back on its feet.

“Last year it was well controlled, with no crowds, travelling in single cars, and that is about the best you can do.

“I think if you bring testing into it, you could cause more upset than anything