WINNIPEG -- A Brandon woman is at home recovering from COVID-19 after spending nearly three weeks in hospital with the virus.

Wendy Russell, 67, was released from the hospital in Brandon one week ago. Russell was released while doctors and nurses at the hospital cheered and applauded her recovery.

A video of the moment was posted on the Prairie Mountain Health Region's Twitter page.

“It was very emotional to see everybody coming out to cheer me on to get me back to normal,” Russell said.

Russell spent 18 days in hospital.

“I started feeling symptoms about two days before (hospital admission) and all of a sudden I don’t remember. It was a lot of different things going on," Russell said, noting she felt tired and had chest pain.

By May 3, after feeling tired and run down, she said she was not sure if she was experiencing COVID-19 symptoms, but she knew it was time to go to the doctor.

“I had heard different things about it, but I didn’t think I had the symptoms. The things that I felt weren’t the things people were talking about,” said Russell.

“I talked to my son, my son called my cousin. She came and was going to take me. But she said, 'No, you’re not going anywhere,’ and she phoned the ambulance.”

After getting the positive COVID-19 test results back, Russell was admitted to the hospital immediately.

“The nurses, the doctors, everybody was wonderful. I couldn’t have asked for any better care. They did what I needed, and were very, very good,” she said.

How she contracted the virus is unknown.

“(I have) just been home here," Russell said. "I had travelled in the winter, but that was five months before."

Russell must continue to rest while in recovery at home, and take it day-by-day.

“I have no energy,” she said. “(The doctors) told me two to three weeks before I’m going to feel like really doing anything."

She has a message for others about the pandemic.

“Do what they are telling you. Stay so many feet away," Russell said. "A lot of people aren’t listening, but you need to listen, because it is serious.”