(Trinidad Express) While Covid-19 cases continue to increase in the Americas, a package of measures has been used to mount an effective fight against the virus in Trinidad and Tobago.
Dr Erica Wheeler PAHO/WHO representative for Trinidad and Tobago and the Dutch Kingdom Islands outlined at yesterday morning’s press briefing that these measures have included detecting, tracing, treating, isolating, quarantining and practicing personal hygiene and sanitization and the closure of the borders.
She said, “I would like us to think of it as a package of measures that have been instituted and instituted early on in order to, what we have so often called, flatten the curve because once you have it in your country the most important thing is that you are able to control the spread.”
Concerning the borders she said, “In the case of Trinidad, bringing back persons in such a way that they know the health system would not be overwhelmed, has been something that has also protected us … In our case, we are an island state so we do have the capacity to determine who comes into the country and very early on there was a determination that certain countries it was not safe to have persons coming in, so we did eventually also closed our borders.”
Wheeler was responding to the question of what this country has been doing right and the lessons that can be learnt while Covid-19 cases rise in other countries in the Americas. She said that there has been continued testing when a person has been identified as having Covid-19 and the ensuring of extensive vigorous and rigorous contact tracing and testing of these individuals “It is an issue of detecting, tracing, treating, isolating, quarantining, all of those things together … What we’ve also been doing is instituting all of the public health measures that WHO and PAHO have suggested which we keep repeating but it is necessary because it’s not common for people to do but observing the physical distancing, the cough etiquette, the hygiene, ensuring also too that there is a system whereby you can house people who’ve been identified as suspected cases but also having the capacity in the health system to treat those who have been identified as having Covid-19.”
She added, “You have to have your health system that’s prepared and equipped and your health workers who are competent enough to treat those who have been diagnosed and who are in hospital and then you also have to have facilities where you can observe people who have been identified as being in contact with someone who contracted Covid-19.”
Pandemic not over
Minister of Health Terrence Deyalsingh said that Covid-19, as it affects the Americas of which this country is a part, is not over. “The pandemic is not slowing down,” he said.
Quoting from a PAHO brief he received this morning he read, “PAHO is deeply concerned with how rapidly the pandemic is expanding.” It was said that it took the Americas three months to reach one million cases but less than three weeks to nearly double that number. The region is approaching four million cases. “As of June 15 this year there have been more than 3.8 million cases and almost 203,600 deaths in the Americas from Covid-19,” he read.