Dr Hinds: Migrants present smallest source of covid19 infection

While there are concerns about the possibility of illegal immigrants entering the country with covid19, health officials say the focus needs to be on people living here when it comes to spreading the virus.

At Wednesday’s media briefing, epidemiologist Dr Avery Hinds said he is concerned that people continue to focus on what is possibly the smallest source of introduction and spread of the virus, and ignore the fact that the general population is TT’s current source of cases.

“We keep going back to reports of individuals breaching borders and, at this point when we’re in community spread, what we need to be more concerned and more vigilant about is our day-to-day interactions – managing our own respiratory illness, managing our own respiratory hygiene and managing the adherence to our public health regulations, recommendations and guidelines.

So my concern is that we keep focusing on something that is probably the least of our worries at this point in time, and that we don’t, in doing so, unduly and unnecessarily stigmatise a small group of people and distract from the more important source of illness.

Every time someone asks, ‘where is the illness coming from?’ It’s coming from the population, and people still have it.”

Chief Medical Officer Dr Roshan Parasram said the issue of migrants introducing diseases into TT was around long before covid19.

“We saw it with malaria where, up to six or seven years ago, it used to come predominantly from India, Africa, Guyana, then it changed to coming from Venezuela and that area of South America.

“It is not specific to covid19 but, because we are so close to other territories, it is a continuing issue of migration more than covid19, for malaria, measles, mumps, rubella, any disease that is predominant in that particular part of the world will come across with its migrants.

“We are cognizant of the fact that beyond covid19 we have to look out for other diseases coming up – yellow fever, MMR (measles, mumps, and rubella), malaria, Chagas disease, HIV.”

Parasram said while introduction and re-introduction of covid19 into TT is a concern in trying to eradicate the disease, the health ministry is trying to get the virus to the lowest possible level in the community.

He said cases of dengue were at the lowest they had been in a decade, with one confirmed case and 44 suspected cases in 2020. He said the public health measures introduced for covid19 had borne fruit as there have been 33 or 34 suspected cases and six confirmed cases of influenza thus far.

Parasram urged parents to make sure their children got the last inoculation in the MMR vaccine, as he said there has been a drop-off in the number of vaccines administered.

“It is something that is a preamble to physical school, as the proof has to be submitted to the schools. So what has happened this year, which is peculiar, people have delayed that immunisation knowing they wouldn’t have to physically go to school for that semester.

“So we’re asking that you complete your immunisation schedule for that four-and-a-half year old, which is your final immunisation. We’re asking people to come in as quickly as they can and have that done even though there isn’t face-to-face school at this time.”