SHAL­IZA HAS­SANALI

In one week, COVID-19 has claimed three mem­bers of a Long­denville fam­i­ly.

Sha­reena Ali, 53, passed away one week af­ter her bedrid­den broth­er-in-law, George Ogeer, 52, who she had been car­ing for. George’s wife Sher­if­fa, 50, Sha­reena’s younger sis­ter, al­so lost her bat­tle with the virus.

The sis­ters, who rel­a­tives said were in­sep­a­ra­ble and loved each oth­er dear­ly, lived next door to each oth­er at Ravine Sable Road.

Their cousin Shi­raz Khan, pres­i­dent of the Trinidad Uni­fied Farm­ers As­so­ci­a­tion, ex­pressed out­rage at the length of time the cou­ple wait­ed to get the re­sults of their PRC tests from the Mon­trose Health Cen­tre. He said Sha­reena was swabbed at the health cen­tre in mid-No­vem­ber.

“She was told to go back home and quar­an­tine,” he said.

While await­ing the re­sults, Sha­reena’s health start­ed to de­cline. The re­sults came back pos­i­tive on No­vem­ber 22.

“That was four days af­ter she was swabbed. I can’t un­der­stand why the re­sults took so long,” Khan said.

The fol­low­ing day, Sha­reena was ad­mit­ted to the In­ten­sive Care Unit at the Cou­va Hos­pi­tal. She died three days lat­er

“She didn’t have a fight­ing chance,” he said, “be­cause by the time she got back the re­sults it was al­ready too late. She was in a crit­i­cal state.”

He said the same thing hap­pened to George who was the first in the fam­i­ly to be swabbed. He went to the health cen­tre in the first week of No­vem­ber af­ter com­plain­ing about feel­ing un­well.

“He too was swabbed and told to go back home and self-quar­an­tine,” said Khan, who be­lieves the sis­ters prob­a­bly con­tract­ed the virus from George.

On No­vem­ber 15, the health cen­tre con­firmed that George had test­ed pos­i­tive.

Khan said George had suf­fered a stroke some time ago and of­ten had seizures.

“The virus even­tu­al­ly spread to his wife and sis­ter-in-law. George had been bedrid­den for six years and Sher­if­fa had to see about him. Sha­reena of­ten helped her younger sis­ter as they lived next to each oth­er and were very close. Re­mem­ber they were look­ing af­ter George even be­fore his re­sults came back pos­i­tive,” he said.

Khan said Sher­if­fa was nev­er swabbed but was the first to die. She was slight­ly over­weight and suf­fered from high blood pres­sure and di­a­betes.

“I don’t know if the Delta virus was re­spon­si­ble for their deaths. Sher­if­fa bat­tled se­vere body pains and had a high fever. The virus rav­aged her or­gans in a few hours. At 6 am on No­vem­ber 19, I re­ceived a call that she had passed away,” he said.

While fam­i­ly mem­bers were mak­ing arrange­ment’s for Sher­if­fa’s fu­ner­al, they were told that George had al­so died.

“They both died sev­en hours apart at home. How we know Sher­if­fa died from COVID? The DMO swabbed her on Fri­day and we got the re­sults the fol­low­ing Wednes­day night, five days lat­er,” Khan said.

“Some­thing is wrong with how this sys­tem is op­er­at­ing. The prob­lem is not vac­ci­nat­ed or un­vac­ci­nat­ed, the prob­lem is that we not get­ting in pub­lic health in­sti­tu­tions im­me­di­ate re­sults, where­as in the pri­vate labs you can pay a few hun­dred dol­lars and get your re­sults the same day or a few hours af­ter.”

“You can­not wait for four and five days for COVID re­sults. That puts oth­er fam­i­ly mem­bers at risk. The prob­lem we have is that when they swabbed some­body at the health cen­tre, why it is, we can’t get back the re­sults ear­ly. Why we can’t have rapid test­ing through­out the coun­try.”

Khan be­lieves that the de­lay has been caus­ing the virus to spread.

“Peo­ple who might be COVID pos­i­tive and wait­ing days to get back their re­sults would be mov­ing around and spread­ing the virus.

Khan said one of Sha­reena’s four chil­dren has test­ed pos­i­tive but is not in any great dan­ger and is in quar­an­tine at home. How­ev­er one of Shereena and Shar­if­fa’s sis­ters-in-law is bat­tling for her life in the ICU at the Ari­ma Gen­er­al Hos­pi­tal.

“She al­so has COVID. This sad news is not some­thing we can eas­i­ly di­gest. Our fam­i­ly has been torn apart in the last few days,” Khan said

He said he was very close to the sis­ters and of­ten vis­it­ed them.

“Those are peo­ple I grew up with and cared for. It is has been heart­break­ing.”

The Ogeers had been mar­ried for 26 years and op­er­at­ed a mi­ni-mart at their home. They had two chil­dren. The cou­ple suf­fered trag­ic loss 12 years ago when their eight-year-old son, Adri­an, died from dengue.

On Thurs­day the Ogeers were buried in the same spot where their son had been laid to rest in the Long­denville Ceme­tery. The next day, Sha­reena was buried next to her sis­ter and broth­er-in-law.