The Min­istry of Health has an­nounced nine ad­di­tion­al cas­es of the Delta Vari­ant.

The Min­istry of Health ad­vis­es the pop­u­la­tion that on the night of 30th Sep­tem­ber, 2021, Trinidad and To­ba­go con­firmed 9 new cas­es of the COVID-19 Delta Vari­ant of Con­cern. This brings the to­tal num­ber of cas­es of the COVID-19 Delta Vari­ant which have been con­firmed for Trinidad and To­ba­go to 26.

3 cas­es (1 non-na­tion­al and 2 na­tion­als) were crew mem­bers on board a ves­sel. These per­sons were not al­lowed to dis­em­bark and spent their pe­ri­od of iso­la­tion on the ves­sel.

1 case is a na­tion­al who re­cent­ly trav­elled to Trinidad from Dubai via Mi­a­mi.

5 oth­er cas­es were found lo­cal­ly in per­sons with no re­cent his­to­ry of trav­el.

The pres­ence of the Delta vari­ant was con­firmed via gene se­quenc­ing at the lab­o­ra­to­ry of the Fac­ul­ty of Med­ical Sci­ences, Uni­ver­si­ty of the West In­dies.

All pa­tients have been placed in iso­la­tion un­til the en­hanced dis­charge cri­te­ria for per­sons with COVID-19 Vari­ants of Con­cern is achieved. Con­tact trac­ing, test­ing and quar­an­ti­ning of con­tacts have al­so been ini­ti­at­ed.

Ac­cord­ing to the World Health Or­gan­i­sa­tion (WHO), there have been con­firmed cas­es of the Delta vari­ant of COVID-19 in 185 coun­tries. Re­search has sug­gest­ed that the Delta vari­ant is more eas­i­ly spread from per­son to per­son as com­pared to pre­vi­ous vari­ants (es­ti­mat­ed to be 2 to 4 times more trans­mis­si­ble than the orig­i­nal Wuhan lin­eage of the virus). Ad­di­tion­al­ly, ev­i­dence in­di­cates that in­di­vid­u­als who have con­tract­ed this vari­ant may be prone to an in­creased risk of se­vere ill­ness and hos­pi­tal­iza­tion. This vari­ant may al­so lead to an in­crease in cas­es of COVID-19 in younger age groups and in those who have been pre­vi­ous­ly in­fect­ed.

The Min­istry of Health urges every­one who is el­i­gi­ble, in­clud­ing those aged 12 to 18, to be vac­ci­nat­ed against the COVID-19 virus as soon as pos­si­ble.

Ad­di­tion­al­ly, mem­bers of the pub­lic are re­mind­ed to fol­low all of the rec­om­mend­ed per­son­al health pro­tec­tive mea­sures, even if they are ful­ly vac­ci­nat­ed:

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

Keep your dis­tance from oth­ers (6 feet)

Wash your hands of­ten with soap and wa­ter or use an al­co­hol-based hand san­i­tiz­er

Stay home if you are ill

Cough in­to a tis­sue or in­to the crook of your el­bow

Avoid touch­ing your face

San­i­tize hard sur­faces (e.g. ta­ble tops, hand rails, door knobs and trol­leys) as of­ten as pos­si­ble.

WHO ap­proved COVID-19 vac­cines are safe, they are ef­fec­tive and they are avail­able in Trinidad and To­ba­go. The pub­lic is en­cour­aged to vis­it the Min­istry of Health’s web­site (www.health.gov.tt) as well as the so­cial me­dia pages of the Min­istry of Health and the Re­gion­al Health Au­thor­i­ties for fur­ther in­for­ma­tion on COVID-19 vac­ci­na­tion.