'I should've gotten the damn vaccine!' Tragic final text sent from 39-year-old father-of-five to his fiancée before he succumbed to COVID after contracting the virus on vacation'

A father-of-five sent a heartbreaking text message to his fiancee saying he should have had the COVID-19 vaccine - just days before he succumbed to the deadly disease. 

Michael Freedy, 39, passed away Thursday at a hospital in his hometown of Las Vegas, less than two weeks after contracting the virus. 

Earlier this month, Freedy and his fiancee, Jessica DuPreeze, took a beach vacation to California with their five kids - aged between 17 and 17 months. 

After returning to Las Vegas, Freedy fell ill and went to hospital believing he was suffering from severe sunstroke. 

Doctors discovered his blood oxygen level was critically low and tested him for Covid, which returned a positive result. 

As his breathing deteriorated, Freedy texted DuPreeze saying: 'I should have gotten the damn vaccine.' He was later placed on a ventilator before he passed away. 

Speaking with KMOV on Friday, a heartbroken DuPreeze explained: 'We wanted to wait just one year from the release of the to see what effects people had, but there was never any intention to not get it'.

She said that she has now had her first shot and will 'always regret' not making Freedy get immunized. 

'He was only 39. Our babies now don't have a dad. You can't say I am young and it won't affect me because it will,' she told the news network. 

Michael Freedy, 39, passed away Thursday at a hospital in his hometown of Las Vegas, less than two weeks after contracting the virus

Freedy is pictured with his fiancee Jessica DuPreeze and four of their five children 

DuPreeze sayshat she has now had her first shot and will 'always regret' not making Freedy get immunized. The couple are pictured together in happier times 

The tragic news comes as America's vaccination rates stall, despite the spread of the highly-contagious Delta variant. 

Less than half of Americans are fully vaccinated as of Friday, with 164 million people, or 49.4% of the total US population, having received both doses of the Pfizer or Moderna vaccine, or a single dose of the Johnson &Johnson jab. 

In the past week, the US has averaged just over 700,000 shots per day - far below the average of 4 million shots per day at the beginning of April. 

Even the surge of the Delta variant does not seem to be incentivizing unvaccinated Americans to get the vaccine. 

On Thursday, the US reported a whopping 95,000 new COVID cases - up from just 15,000 on the same day last month. 

Meanwhile, DuPreeze has defended her decision to go on vacation with Freedy and their kids on a GoFundMe account. 

'It was to get the kids out of the heat advisory warning that Vegas had, but also because we actually had two days off in a row together. We went to the beach,' she stated, sharing a photo of Freedy holding their youngest son on the shore. 

DuPreeze continued to update the page as her partner's condition deteriorated, before she heartbreakingly disclosed he had died on Thursday. 

'I was at the hospital visiting Mike and telling him all about our kids day and how everyone was pulling for him. His numbers crashed and they were not able to bring them back up,' she wrote. 

'The love of my life, my rock, my everything. The father to my babies, is no longer with us. I don’t know what to do.'

DuPreeze defended her decision to go on vacation with Freedy and their kids on a GoFundMe page

DuPreeze shared this selfie that Freedy took as he fought COVID in the ICU 

The couple share five children together, and DuPreeze has been left heartbroken by her partner's shock death