Seriously ill patients are still a concern even as COVID cases fall

Despite a rapid reduction in the country’s COVID-19 cases, a leading public-health official is expressing tremendous concern about the number of seriously-ill patients at the main isolation facility.

Head of Infection Control and Infectious Disease at the Queen Elizabeth Hospital (QEH) Dr. Corey Forde revealed that there are still a number of young people among COVID-19 patients exhibiting troubling symptoms.

On the anniversary of Barbados’ first recorded case, he warned that the country is still at a critical point where citizens ought to continue doing the “right things”.

“All I am going to say is that the number of ill people has not really changed. I think people are still presenting ill, so that particular parameter at this point has not dramatically changed. In the ICU, you would see there are still a good set of people who are not well. So yes, the general numbers have fallen, but as that has happened, we still have people who are ill,” Dr. Forde told reporters during a tour of the facility at Harrison Point, St. Lucy.

“They’re not all old people… and we are not just seeing older people with comorbidities. They are some very young people who are actually within the facility as well, but whatever happens, we will continue to provide the level of medical care,” the infectious disease expert added.

Over the last few weeks, the number of active cases has fallen to 147 after weeks of case surges that reached as high as 826. After a six-week lockdown, the improving situation triggered a return to most non-essential commercial activity from Monday.

But Dr. Forde, who heads the St Lucy primary facility, revealed that 15 people were in intensive care, including four on ventilators and three on dialysis. And, even in secondary isolation, the number of symptomatic patients is troubling.

“So yes we are at a place in this country where there is a little bit more comfort in terms of numbers, but I just want to continue to ask the public … to please remember to wear their masks, do the appropriate distancing and of course, as the vaccine is available, which I believe is a silver bullet, to really go ahead and get the vaccine, knowing that many countries have not even started their vaccination programmes,” he urged.

Minister of Health and Wellness Lieutenant Colonel Jeffrey Bostic, who toured numerous COVID-19 facilities on Wednesday declared that community spread remains a factor, despite a significant reduction in hotspots.

He suggested that the ultimate goal is a return to pre-December COVID-19 levels, and promised that a “focused” approach to island-wide random testing would continue.

“We’ve done about three or four communities of interest to us so far and fortunately, for the most part, those results have come back negative except for one in a particular community, and that exercise is going to be expanded and will even go into some of the [rural] communities, so that we can be sure that we don’t have residual impacts of COVID cases within the communities,”  Bostic explained.

“For me, I would like for us to return to the pre-December days and then I will be satisfied that we are really on the right track and we are on top of things. We are getting there, but there is still a bit of work to do because 16 or 17 cases, though lower than before, are still too high for my liking,” he added.
(kareemsmith@barbadostoday.bb)