Hospital workers are expected to follow standard precautions while ensuring that patients receive immediate treatment for their illnesses regardless of whether they were tested for COVID-19 or not, according to Guyana’s newly-appointed Chief Medical Officer (CMO) Dr. Narine Singh.
During an interview with Stabroek News yesterday, Guy-ana’s newly-appointed CMO stated that healthcare workers are not routinely tested for COVID-19, hence the need for standard precautions to be followed.
Following “standard precautions” means that healthcare workers will have to assume every person seeking treatment at a hospital is potentially infected or colonized with a pathogen that could be transmitted in the health care setting.
Singh explained that before treating a patient, heath care workers should be attired in the Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) and avoid personal contact with patients as much as possible.
He was at the time responding to claims by relatives of a COVID-19 fatality that the now deceased woman was not treated for her underlying health condition because doctors were awaiting test results to confirm her COVID-19 status. According to a close friend of the deceased, the woman died at the COVID-19 transition ward at the George-town Public Hospital (GPH) awaiting treatment.
“We treat every patient as if they are COVID-19 positive. Once you practice the precautions in general—and we treat everybody in the same way—we can treat them whether they are COVID positive or not,” he said before noting that there might be times when doctors would have no choice but to have close contact with an ill patient but in these cases there are certain procedures that will need to be followed.
He added that if a healthcare worker refuses to attend to a patient, that would be very unethical and such behaviour would not be tolerated. However, he noted that there is no need for a COVID-19 test result for a patient to be treated for existing underlying health conditions.
“When you come in for another (health) problem, not being tested doesn’t prevent anyone from accessing care. What has happened is that some of the hospital services like elective surgeries had to stand down because of the capacity of the hospital and the amount of space available,” he noted.
Health Minister Dr. Frank Anthony had recently revealed that persons are tested upon admission to the GPH.
Better able
As it relates to COVID-19 deaths, Singh stated that many persons who were admitted to the hospital for other conditions later tested positive for COVID-19 which contributed to their deaths. He stated that 70% of persons who died from COVID-19 are over the age for 50 and had existing health conditions. He added that to date although a number of children have tested
positive for COVID-19, no one from that category has died as their immune systems are better able to fight off the respiratory disease.
Singh noted that the younger Guyanese population’s refusal to adhere to government imposed restrictions and other precautionary measures is contributing to the increase of COVID-19 cases and deaths. He noted that many of the deceased may have been adhering to the measures but their relatives might not have been doing so.
“It’s not the older people going and party, it’s the stronger and younger people who are going and carrying it home to these older people at home. That’s the bad thing about COVID, asymptomatic persons can shed the virus and that’s why people have to be responsible and the questionnaire that we ask patients in home isolation if anyone elderly is living in that home,” he said.
Up to yesterday, 117 persons had died after contracting COVID-19. According to the Health Ministry, 82 of the COVID-19 fatalities died while at the GPH, with 48 infected persons dying while receiving treatment in its COVID-19 Intensive Care Unit.
Medication
Meanwhile, regarding medication used to treat COVID-19, the CMO revealed that they are not only using remdesivir but also hydroxychloroquine and zithromax. The World Health Organization (WHO) recently published research from a clinical trial showing that remdesivir barely reduces the mortality rate of COVID-19 patients, casting doubt about its effectiveness, while concerns have been raised about the adverse effects of hydroxychloroquine on patients during trials. “There is no standardised treatment for COVID-19 and all the treatments that are available are basically still in the experimental stages but we have a protocol that we are using. Those drugs are available in Guyana and some of them are not being used widely around the world,” Singh, however, noted.
Singh added that there is no shortage of those drugs in Guyana but the ministry is hoping to acquire more of those drugs in the near future. Further, he said they are also treating patients for whatever underlying health conditions they have with medication created specifically for those purposes.
However, he said, all COVID-19 patients need supportive care.
As it relates to a vaccine, the CMO said that they are hoping that a COVID-19 vaccine is available by mid-November. “There are several vaccines in different stages of development. WHO (World Health Organisation) has six that’s ready for use. We hope that by mid-November that we will get one. Guyana has contributed to COVAX and that’s been evaluated by WHO. Once WHO give them the go-ahead, we will expect them by mid-November,” he said.
