rishard.khan@guardian.co.tt
Today marks exactly two years since T&T recorded its first COVID-19 cases.
After a long battle with the disease, the Government is now determined it’s time to change gears, moving toward treating the disease as endemic.
While it’s a relief for many who are exhausted with the pandemic, public health policy diplomat and epidemiologist Dr Farley Cleghorn says the move comes with some caveats.
He said considering the outbreak as endemic means it will no longer be combated by initiating national emergency responses but by sustained management of the disease, accepting it as part of life.
This means no more lockdowns and heavy restrictions.
“It means how do we incorporate it into our daily lives, into our daily tasks, into public health, into surveillance, into hospital care. All of that has to be accomplished but on a non-emergent basis.”
However, given T&T’s epidemiology, he does not believe the country is at endemic levels yet, as its wave of infections appears to have plateaued at a relatively high level.
“Trinidad today has an average seven-day case rate of about 350 cases and it has an average seven-day death rate of five cases. That is not endemic. If you want to call that endemic, it means in perpetuity we will be mounting a robust response against COVID,” he said.
“If we look at the data for Trinidad, Trinidad is not even in what I call the tail end of the epidemic because at three of four hundred cases a day, that’s not the tail end.”
Dr Cleghorn believes the number of fatalities needs to be reduced to zero for a comfortable admission of endemicity.
He admits the science is uncertain about what is an endemic level of the SARS-CoV-2 virus within a given population. He said a clearer picture can be developed by comparing it to other diseases such as yellow fever or seasonal influenza.
“The chief features (of endemicity) of stability, predictability and perhaps seasonality—none of those have a clear answer for coronavirus. They don’t,” he said.
He said the move toward endemicity is understandable, as many other countries are adopting a similar perspectives. However, he said it was crucial that contingencies are put in place to mount an effective national response should the outbreak regain momentum.
“It’s a declared policy shift, which is acceptable, but you gotta back it up. You have to be able to back it up so you know the situation in your country and that you can hit the surge button on the response again,” he said.
“You have to put plans in motion that you can operationalise should that situation arise. How would you know that situation will arise? You have to leave in place the detection and surveillance mechanisms that allow you to know what the accurate daily count is.”
Despite the move towards resuming some semblance of normalcy, Dr Cleghorn believes many public health measures such as social distancing and mask-wearing will persist for the foreseeable future.
