Com­mis­sion­er of Po­lice Gary Grif­fith is as­sur­ing that a po­lice of­fi­cer who test­ed pos­i­tive for the COVID-19 virus did not come in­to con­tact with any of his col­leagues as he is cur­rent­ly on va­ca­tion.

The of­fi­cer, who is at­tached to a po­lice sta­tion in south Trinidad, re­cent­ly re­turned from New York and is now be­ing treat­ed at the Cou­va Hos­pi­tal, which is one of the two main fa­cil­i­ties where COVID pa­tients are be­ing treat­ed.

In a re­lease Wednes­day, Grif­fith con­firmed the of­fi­cer had test­ed pos­i­tive and was grant­ed per­mis­sion to leave the coun­try dur­ing his va­ca­tion. The of­fi­cer left for New York on Feb­ru­ary 26 and re­turned to Trinidad on March 18, Grif­fith said. How­ev­er, he said con­trary to what was be­ing cir­cu­lat­ed on so­cial me­dia, the of­fi­cer nev­er made con­tact with col­leagues.

Grif­fith said on his re­turn home, the of­fi­cer was met at the Pi­ar­co In­ter­na­tion­al Air­port by a fe­male friend, who took him to his home. How­ev­er, the of­fi­cer lat­er com­plained of feel­ing un­well and was tak­en to a doc­tor on March 19. The of­fi­cer re­turned home af­ter he was treat­ed, but lat­er com­plained of body pains and was tak­en to the health fa­cil­i­ty in the area where he lives. The of­fi­cer was at­tend­ed to and tak­en by am­bu­lance to the San Fer­nan­do Gen­er­al Hos­pi­tal.

Based on the find­ings of the doc­tors at the hos­pi­tal, the of­fi­cer was then trans­ferred to the Cou­va Hos­pi­tal where he is now be­ing treat­ed. He re­ceived con­fir­ma­tion from the Min­istry of Health that he had test­ed pos­i­tive. His fe­male friend al­so checked in­to the Cau­ra Hos­pi­tal where she was test­ed and is now await­ing re­sults.

The TTPS al­so learnt that the broth­er of the of­fi­cer has placed him­self in­to self-quar­an­tine be­cause he had con­tact with him.

Grif­fith, who had him­self gone in­to self-quar­an­tine af­ter re­cent trav­el, said the TTPS has ini­ti­at­ed cer­tain pro­to­cols for the COVID-19 pan­dem­ic and has cir­cu­lat­ed this to all of­fi­cers. The TTPS is al­so work­ing with the Min­istry of Health to en­sure all pro­to­cols are in place to deal with the cri­sis.

Con­tact­ed yes­ter­day, TTPS So­cial and Wel­fare As­so­ci­a­tion pres­i­dent In­sp Gideon Dick­son ap­plaud­ed the of­fi­cer for be­ing re­spon­si­ble enough to self-quar­an­tine and stay with­in pro­to­cols. He as­sured that the catch­ment of con­tact was very lit­tle be­cause of the of­fi­cer’s re­spon­si­ble ac­tions when he turned from his trip to the US.

Al­so asked if of­fi­cers we’re ob­ject­ing to car­ry­ing out their du­ties due to the COVID-19 pan­dem­ic, Dick­son replied: “No, they are all re­port­ing for du­ties as usu­al. But there are cer­tain pro­to­cols and poli­cies in place for them.

“For in­stance, we have min­imised face to face con­tact with mem­bers of the pub­lic, so in some cas­es not any­one can now just walk in­to any charge room of the po­lice sta­tion.”

Dick­son al­so dis­closed that shift hours are be­ing ad­just­ed by di­vi­sions heads so that of­fi­cers wouldn’t be “burned out”.