PAHO team’s eye on SVG volcano shelter condition

KINGSTOWN – Health experts are watching the conditions in packed shelters in St Vincent and the Grenadines that are housing scores of displaced citizens in the midst of a raging pandemic.

Officials from the Pan American Health Organisation (PAHO) Barbados-based office, responding to numerous eruptions from the La Soufriére volcano said they are monitoring the shelters for the level of physical distancing to prevent the spread of the coronavirus, the provision of clean water and sanitation.

PAHO’s Health and Climate Change Advisor Jonathan Drewry is part of a Caribbean Disaster Emergency Management Agency (CDEMA) team providing a rapid assessment of the situation on the ground.

He told Barbados TODAY: “A lot of it is also going to be determining what are the environmental health needs within the shelters, within the communities and obviously that looks at a number of different things beyond sanitation and water, but also vulnerable populations, spacing in shelters, nutrition and a number of different things,” Drewry told a contingent of reporters in Kingstown.

“I think looking out for those who are over 60 years old, those with disabilities, those with special needs are very important and so I think… there may be issues within the shelters of air quality, hygiene or sanitation, making sure that the elderly have the medical care that they need and are in the conditions that are adequate for them to be fine.”

Thousands of people have been evacuated from the island’s northeastern exclusion zone as a precaution against explosions and pyroclastic flows – the dense mass of superheated ash, rocks and gases that could spread rapidly down hillsides.

The evacuation has led to cramped emergency shelters, displaced families and, in some cases, slender supplies of food and water.

Drewry explained that in addition to dwindling water supply, ash and other particles in the distribution system are posing a tremendous danger to residents’ health. The PAHO team has supplied water-testing kits along with other medical supplies.

“I think the tests have been sent out and they are still waiting for those to come back in, but I think in the shelters that he has visited in other places, the water is flowing. It’s just a matter of determining if it’s potable and how the ash has affected it,” Drewry explained.

A Barbados Defence Force (BDF) field medical hospital is on standby to temporarily supplement hard-hit health clinics, according to  PAHO consultant Peter Burgess.

Burgess said: “They are fully equipped, they are ready, they have oxygen, which is going to be a big need. They also need the necessary equipment that could produce oxygen also, stretchers and a wealth of knowledge. There are surgeons on the team, ER physicians. The team is fully equipped.

“We have to look to see what health centres are open, what are their needs, what are their capabilities. We also have to look at the chronic illnesses that might be going to those health facilities and also the main hospitals and once we do that assessment, then PAHO will assist wherever need be in either providing medical supplies if its a case where persons have to be taken off-island for medical treatment, that is where PAHO comes in.”

While adding he was uncertain about the COVID-19 situation in the shelters, the PAHO consulted noted that part of the group’s missions surrounds an inquiry into whether adequate testing is being conducted in shelters.

In addition to the short-term response, CDEMA’s five-day mission is also focusing on the medium and long-term recovery of those severely affected by the eruptions.

The Regional Security Service (RSS) Training Institute Manager, Retired Brigadier General Earl Arthurs, is leading the CDEMA detail. He revealed that an entire team from regional organisations is first assessing the needs on the ground for recommendations to be used by the St Vincent and the Grenadines government.

Brigadier General Arthurs said: “People are in shelters. They need food, health systems and things like that. But the people in the shelters go back home to their farms and their houses, it cannot happen just like that.

“There will have to be some rehabilitation space in between and that is your medium-term that we are talking about. The short term is just to find shelters right now for them to stay in, feed them and look after their health and stuff. But then they have to move out of the shelters into  emergency housing and temporary housing systems and then after that they need to rebuild their homes and farms better than they had before

“We have five days to do that and submit a report to the Government of St Vincent and the Grenadines and then go back home.” (kareemsmith@barbadostoday.bb)