As of Oc­to­ber 8th, To­ba­go has an ad­di­tion­al 24 ad­di­tion­al COVID cas­es, push­ing the to­tal num­ber of in­fec­tions on the is­land to 102.

Eigh­teen of those cas­es—five prison of­fi­cers and 13 pris­on­ers—were record­ed at the is­land's prison.

The oth­er six cas­es are con­tacts of "re­cent pos­i­tive cas­es".

This is ac­cord­ing to a re­lease from the THA’s Di­vi­sion of Health, Well­ness and Fam­i­ly De­vel­op­ment.

The re­lease said pris­on­ers who test­ed pos­i­tive will be trans­ferred to a Trinidad fa­cil­i­ty this af­ter­noon, with help from the Trinidad and To­ba­go Coast Guard, un­til a "tem­po­rary prison" is pre­pared to house them in To­ba­go.

To­ba­go has a par­al­lel COVID-19 health care treat­ment sys­tem at the old Scar­bor­ough Hos­pi­tal, Fort King George.

The is­land al­so us­es a ho­tel as a step-down fa­cil­i­ty for oth­er cas­es.

Pos­i­tive per­sons who need in­ten­sive care treat­ment are housed at the hos­pi­tal at Sig­nal Hill in a COVID-19 ready unit.

Here is the full text of the re­lease…

UP­DATE #50 – CORO­N­AVIRUS DIS­EASE 2019 (COVID-19) IN TO­BA­GO

Wil­son Road, 08th Oc­to­ber, 2020, 10:30am:

Twen­ty four (24) ad­di­tion­al cas­es test­ed pos­i­tive for COVID-19 in To­ba­go. All es­tab­lished pro­to­cols were im­ple­ment­ed, in­clu­sive of con­tact trac­ing, which is on­go­ing.

Eigh­teen (18) of the ad­di­tion­al cas­es were from the To­ba­go Prison; 5 Prison Of­fi­cers and 13 pris­on­ers. The 13 pris­on­ers have been iso­lat­ed from the oth­er in­mates who test­ed neg­a­tive.

The re­main­ing six (6) ad­di­tion­al cas­es were con­tacts of re­cent pos­i­tive cas­es.

A fa­cil­i­ty has been ac­quired and is be­ing pre­pared for use as an iso­la­tion fa­cil­i­ty for COVID-19 pos­i­tive pris­on­ers. Arrange­ments are be­ing made for of­fi­cials from the Min­istry of Na­tion­al Se­cu­ri­ty to in­spect the fa­cil­i­ty this af­ter­noon. Once prepa­ra­tions have been com­plet­ed and the Min­istry gives the nec­es­sary ap­proval, the fa­cil­i­ty will be used as a “Tem­po­rary Prison” to iso­late COVID-19 pos­i­tive pris­on­ers.

Since the fa­cil­i­ty is cur­rent­ly not ready for use, the 13 COVID-19 pos­i­tive pris­on­ers will be trans­ferred to Trinidad this af­ter­noon via the Trinidad and To­ba­go Coast Guard. As soon as the pris­on­ers have been trans­ferred, the Prison will be deep cleaned and san­i­tized.

The re­main­ing Prison Of­fi­cers and pris­on­ers who test­ed neg­a­tive for COVID-19, will con­tin­ue to be mon­i­tored dai­ly for 14 days, and if any­one de­vel­ops symp­toms, they will be re-test­ed.

The clin­i­cal up­date for To­ba­go is as fol­lows:

● Num­ber of per­sons dis­charged = 66

● Num­ber of sam­ples sub­mit­ted to the To­ba­go Re­gion­al Health Au­thor­i­ty (TRHA) and oth­er lo­cal sites to test for COVID-19 = 1325

● Num­ber of sam­ples that test­ed pos­i­tive for COVID-19 = 102

º Num­ber of ac­tive COVID-19 cas­es = 34

- Num­ber of pa­tients at the COVID-19 Treat­ment Fa­cil­i­ty = 9

- Num­ber of pa­tients at the COVID-19 In­ten­sive Care Unit = 1

- Num­ber of pa­tients at the step-down fa­cil­i­ty = 0

- Num­ber of pa­tients en route to the COVID-19 Treat­ment Fa­cil­i­ty = 11

- Num­ber of pa­tients en route to Treat­ment Fa­cil­i­ties in Trinidad = 13

º Num­ber of deaths = 2

The pub­lic is re­mind­ed to prac­tice all pre­ven­ta­tive and safe­ty mea­sures, which in­clude:

● Wash your hands of­ten with soap and wa­ter for at least 20 sec­onds. If soap and wa­ter are not avail­able, use an al­co­hol-based hand san­i­tiz­er.

● Wear a mask over your nose and mouth when you go out in pub­lic

● Cov­er your cough or sneeze with your flexed el­bow, or with a tis­sue, then throw the tis­sue in the trash and wash your hands.

● Avoid close con­tact with any­one with cold or flu-like symp­toms.

● Stay at home when you are sick and call the hot­line at 800-HEAL (4325).

● Prac­tice phys­i­cal dis­tanc­ing (6 feet away from per­sons).

● Clean and dis­in­fect fre­quent­ly touched ob­jects and sur­faces (door han­dles, cell phones etc.)

If per­sons have flu-like symp­toms, stay at home and call the COVID-19 Hot­line, toll free at 800 HEAL (4325).