47-year-old Vadivel Paramesh is one of the five patients who urgently received new lungs at Sahlgrenska University Hospital in Gothenburg.
He was perfectly healthy when he contracted covid-19 exactly one year ago.
While his wife and nine-year-old daughter became mildly ill, his condition rapidly deteriorated.
He eventually became so ill that he had to receive around-the-clock ECMO treatment to survive.
It involves oxygenating the blood through a kind of artificial lung outside the body.
After a couple of months, it became clear that his lungs were so damaged by the virus that they would not recover according to the doctors.
New lungs were all that remained.
- I waited for new lungs for 148 days and breathed with the help of an ECMO machine, he says.
Artificial lung for 148 days
His wife and daughter visited him every other day in the hospital and they hovered in uncertainty for a long time.
But finally the news they longed for came.
Doctors announced that they had found lungs that would fit him.
- We were so happy and I thanked God.
I also want to pay tribute to my wife and daughter and all the doctors for everything they have done for me.
He suddenly becomes very moved and tears run down his cheeks as he says that he would like to know who the donor's family is so he can thank them for giving him his life back.
He knows it's impossible – but one thing he knows for sure is that he wouldn't be alive today if he had stayed in India.
See and hear more in the clip about Vadivel's life with the new lungs.