25 deaths, 491 more covid19 cases recorded

The number of new covid19 cases detected continues to increase following the lull over the Christmas weekend.

The Health Ministry’s covid19 update on Thursday said 491 new cases were detected from samples taken between December 26 and 29.

The death toll now stands at 2850, with 25 more deaths being recorded.

The update said the people who died were seven elderly men, nine elderly women, three middle-aged men, five middle-aged women and one young adult woman. It said 14 of these people had multiple comorbidities, including a mix of diabetes, hypertension, heart disease, kidney disease, asthma, liver disease, lung disease, obesity, dementia, thyroid disease, and a history of strokes. Five people each had only one comorbidity, while six people had no known comorbidities.

It said the number of active cases is now 15,863.

Since March 2020, there have been 91,320 cases of covid19, of which 72,607 have recovered.

There are 476 patients in hospital. Of these, there are 114 people at the Couva Hospital and Multi-Training Facility, with 25 in the intensive care unit and 19 in the high dependency unit. There are 46 people at the Caura Hospital, 54 at the Augustus Long Hospital, ten at the St Ann’s Hospital, 73 at the Arima General Hospital, 90 at the new Point Fortin Hospital, 50 at the St James Medical Complex, 33 at the Scarborough Regional Hospital, Fort King George and six at the Scarborough Regional Hospital, Signal Hill.

There are 163 patients in step-down facilities, with none at the Claxton Bay Correctional Facility, 59 at UWI Debe, 27 at UTT Valsayn, 32 at the Point Fortin Area Hospital, 27 at the Port of Spain field hospital, none at the Couva Field Hospital, 16 at the Tacarigua Facility, and two in Tobago.

There are 34 people in state quarantine facilities, and 14,733 people in home self-isolation.

There are 426 recovered community cases and 88 people have been discharged from public health facilities.

The ministry said 86.8 per cent or 8,973 of 10,336 patients in the parallel healthcare system were unvaccinated, based on data from July 22-December 15.

The update said the total number of people vaccinated with their first dose of a two-dose regime was 662,242, compared to 660,888, an increase of 1,354 from Wednesday. Of these, 120,100 took the AstraZeneca vaccine, 420,127 took Sinopharm, and 122,015 took the Pfizer vaccine.

The number of people vaccinated with their second dose was 619,173, while the number of people vaccinated with the one-shot Johnson & Johnson vaccine was 48,550.

There are 667,723 people who have been fully vaccinated out of an eligible 1.1 million people. A total of 72,380 people have received an additional primary dose or a booster dose, an increase of 2,641 from the previous day.

The number of people tested in both public and private facilities is 503,400, of which 218,806 were done at private facilities.