Covid19 deaths now 33, virus takes toll on men

Two men, one with comorbidities and another said to be elderly, are the latest people to have died as a result of covid19. This brings the total number of deaths to 33.

In this past week, nine men died from the virus.

The Ministry of Health's covid19 update on Saturday evening said an additional 190 people tested positive, with those samples being taken from August 28 to September 4. Thirty-three of those people were already quarantined at public health facilities and have not been circulating in the national community.

At the Ministry of Health virtual press conference on Saturday morning, Chief Medical Officer Dr Roshan Parasram explained that the 33 were from a cohort of about 190 people from the police training facility. Forty-three had symptoms and were moved to Freedom Hall at UWI's St Augustine campus. They were all tested and ten were negative for the virus.

“Two individuals tested positive last week. We have since quarantined all the persons that have symptoms and tested those. We are in the process of re-testing the remaining 150 of those individuals. Once we get the results of those individuals, we will subsequently put them into different groups based on their status, positive or negative, and then decant as need be.”

In a later statement, the Police Service said 32 recruits from the Police Academy in St James tested positive. It said one tested positive on August 25, and another on August 28, so the 42 in direct contact with the two were quarantined at the St Augustine campus.

“A decision has been made to test the remaining 143 recruits who are in training, as well as the instructors and other persons at the Academy. As a result, the proposed graduation on September 16, and passing out of this batch of recruits seven days later, have been put been postponed indefinitely.”

The number of samples submitted to public and private facilities was 24,884, the total number of cases is now 2,230, and the number of active cases increased from 1,302 on Friday evening to 1,480 on Saturday evening.

The morning update said there are 25 people at Caura hospital, and 75 at Couva with five in the intensive care unit and 11 in the high dependency unit. Sixty-nine people 69 will be processed for admission at the discretion of the county medical officer of health (CMOH).

In quarantine there are 26 at the Home of Football, 95 at Paria Suites hotel, and 25 at the Regent Star hotel, 12 at the Chancellor Hotel, and 13 at Cascadia Hotel. An additional 1,185 people have been home-quarantined under the continuous monitoring of the respective CMOH offices, and there are 39 at step-down facilities. Ten more people were discharged bringing the number to 717.