Loyse Vin­cent

The Mag­dale­na Grand Ho­tel will be used as a tem­po­rary vac­ci­na­tion site ex­clu­sive­ly for work­ers in the tourism and con­struc­tion sec­tors on Sat­ur­day.

The an­nounce­ment was made by To­ba­go health of­fi­cials yes­ter­day dur­ing the Di­vi­sion of Health Well­ness and Fam­i­ly De­vel­op­ment’s week­ly press brief­ing.

Gen­er­al man­ag­er of Pri­ma­ry Health­care of the To­ba­go Re­gion­al Health Au­thor­i­ty (TRHA) Dr Rox­anne Mitchell said so far 7235 shots have been ad­min­is­tered and of that amount 404 peo­ple have al­ready re­ceived the sec­ond dose of the vac­cine.

She said 10,759 peo­ple are al­so cur­rent­ly reg­is­tered to be vac­ci­nat­ed.

She said there is an in­crease in de­mand for vac­cines but the cur­rent on­line reg­is­tra­tion sys­tem re­mains in place and on­ly one ad­di­tion­al site will be set up to ac­com­mo­date 1500 peo­ple in the tourism and con­struc­tion sec­tors.

“That site will be the Mag­dale­na Gran Ho­tel. I would like to pub­licly thank the man­ag­er and staff of that es­tab­lish­ment that site will be up and run­ning on Sat­ur­day June 12 from 8 am to 4 pm. We will be­gin vac­ci­nat­ing ex­clu­sive­ly, mem­bers of the tourism and con­struc­tion sec­tor, we have se­cured vac­cines for these in­dus­tries,” Mitchell said.

Ac­cord­ing to Health Sec­re­tary Tra­cy David­son Ce­les­tine, there is an in­crease in de­mand for vac­cines on the is­land as sev­er­al in­ter­est groups in­clud­ing fish­er­men and sev­er­al cat­e­gories of hos­pi­tal work­ers such as kitchen staff, have asked to be in­clud­ed as groups for pri­or­i­ty vac­ci­na­tion, but there will be no de­vi­a­tion from the cur­rent on­line reg­is­tra­tion process.

She said the vac­ci­nat­ed needs of the is­land are cur­rent­ly be­ing met and To­ba­go will achieve herd im­mu­ni­ty by Sep­tem­ber.

She said, “We are well in line with the na­tion­al arrange­ment to at least have 60 per cent of the pop­u­la­tion vac­ci­nat­ed by late Au­gust ear­ly Sep­tem­ber of this year. We are just about 29,000 peo­ple to be vac­ci­nat­ed and by the end of the week­end that will go up by an­oth­er 2,000 per­sons.”

Ac­cord­ing to Mitchell, the tar­get­ed rate of vac­ci­na­tion on the is­land was set at 150 vac­cines ad­min­is­tered dai­ly and cur­rent­ly, the rate of vac­ci­na­tion is 313 vac­cines per day.

The Health Sec­re­tary said thus far there have been no chal­lenges with ac­cess­ing vac­cines from Trinidad and if the cur­rent trend con­tin­ues, the is­land will soon be able to re­turn to nor­mal­cy.

“We are well in line with the na­tion­al arrange­ment to at least have 60% of the pop­u­la­tion vac­ci­nat­ed by late Au­gust-ear­ly Sep­tem­ber of this year we are just about 29,000 peo­ple to be vac­ci­nat­ed and by the end of the week­end that will go up by an­oth­er 2,000 per­sons,” David­son Ce­les­tine said.

There are cur­rent­ly three vac­ci­na­tion sites on the is­land, the Canaan Health Cen­tre, the Scar­bor­ough Health Cen­tre and the Rox­bor­ough Health Cen­tre.

On Wednes­day, scores of To­bag­o­ni­ans turned up to the vac­ci­na­tion sites ex­pect­ing to be vac­ci­nat­ed.

They were, how­ev­er, turned away as the walk-in sys­tem on­ly ap­plied to Trinidad.

Mitchell said peo­ple from Trinidad can, how­ev­er, reg­is­ter to be vac­ci­nat­ed in To­ba­go and they will be ac­com­mo­dat­ed as long as “these per­sons fall with­in the 60 and over cat­e­go­ry, they have co­mor­bidi­ties, are front­line work­ers or one of the pri­or­i­ty groups.

She said the ob­jec­tive is to vac­ci­nate as many per­sons as pos­si­ble. Ac­cord­ing to Mitchell 45,000 peo­ple in To­ba­go are el­i­gi­ble for vac­ci­na­tion and the TRHA has set a tar­get of 60 per cent of those peo­ple to be vac­ci­nat­ed in or­der to achieve herd im­mu­ni­ty.