Seek and Save: 18 cases in community

Operation Seek and Save has so far found 18 cases of COVID-19 from the over 60,000 households it has visited in communities across the nation, the chairman of the Cabinet’s Sub-Committee on COVID-19, Senator Dr Jerome Walcott, announced on Monday.

The Foreign Affairs minister and surgeon, who has responsibility for coordinating Operation Seek and Save, said that over 62, 000 households had been covered and 168 “suspicious households” – homes where COVID-19 infections are suspected had been identified. As of Sunday, 236 rapid antigen tests had been done along with 197 PCR tests, he added.

While he did not name the communities where the coronavirus had been found, Dr Walcott said cases were located in Christ Church, St Philip, St George, St Thomas and St Michael.

He said: “Up to [Sunday], they were 18 positive cases and they are scattered across the island. We’ve found four cases in Christ Church West Central, in St Philip North we found two cases, in St George, they were two, I think they were three in St Thomas, in the western part of St Michael they were three and I believe another three, so they are dispersed throughout the island.

“The good news is that certainly from this Seek and Save we have not found cases in St Lucy, St Peter, St Andrew, St Joseph, St John.

“The project continues, you might be aware that it not only entails students going around doing a survey, but it has a phase two of it which comprises a number of health professionals; paramedical people, doctors and nurses involved.”

He said the phase two surveyors would carry out assessments and conduct swabbing, rapid antigen tests and PCR tests.

Operation Seek and Save, an initiative aimed at identifying people in the community who may be infected with COVID-19, is being conducted in collaboration with the University of the West Indies.

Over 400 people, including UWI students, have been trained at the UWI and nine swabbing teams have been assembled.
(RB)