Casandra Thompson-Forbes
Tobago now has four active COVID-19 cases and an overall tally of eight since the start of the pandemic.
Speaking at a news conference on Thursday, Secretary for Health Wellness and Family Development Councilor Tracy Davidson-Celestine said her division has a plan in process which takes into account fluid and dynamic scenarios.
“In terms of our systems that we are currently testing persons in Tobago with, the procurement of the PCR machine and this facility has allowed us to improve our response time in terms of providing results to those suspected cases. We have since improved our ventilation capacity at the ICU,” she said.
Davidson-Celestine added that the Intensive Care Unit can accommodate 11 to 16 patients on ventilations at any one time. She said the Tobago House of Assembly (THA) has approximately 65 rooms which can be commissioned in short order and efforts are being made to find additional rooms if there is an escalation of positive COVID cases on the island.
She said with the use of volunteers, they have been able to achieve effective contact tracing.
Meanwhile, County Medical Officer Health Dr Tiffany Hoyte says that over 120 persons are currently quarantined on the island. She said many persons have come forward with concerns about the movements of the positive contacts, and the possibility of coming into contact with them.
“So simply being in the same store with someone, does not make you a contact of the person, simply being in the same building with someone if they worked in the same building, does not make you a contact. We are looking for that close contact with the person to be considered a primary contact, within two metres for at least fifteen minutes, or if you are sharing a confined space for up to two hours,” Hoyte said.