Deyalsingh: Drop in dengue cases at public hospitals

HEALTH Minister Terrence Deyalsingh says there has been a recent reduction in the number of dengue cases at public health facilities.

He said this to reporters during the handover of Phoenix Park Gas Processors Ltd's (PPGPL) donation of oncology diagnostic and imaging machines to the ministry at the Cancer Centre in the St James Medical Complex on September 7.

The minister said dengue comes around every seven to ten years and, in Trinidad and Tobago (TT), the last outbreak (or any significant deviation from the norm) was in 2014. He stressed dengue is not only a problem in TT.

The European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control said since the beginning of the year, over 12 million cases and over 8,000 dengue-related deaths have been reported across 86 countries/territories.

Up to September 6, TT had 1,315 lab-confirmed cases of dengue fever and 13 lab-confirmed deaths. The number of cases rose by 262 and deaths, by one, compared to the ministry's September 4 update.

North West Regional Health Authority (NWRHA) CEO Anthony Blake agreed with Deyalsingh saying since a national centre for dengue testing was established at the St James Medical Complex, hundreds of people have been treated. He said this reduced the load at the accident and emergency departments at Port of Spain General and at the St James Complex where recently, there had been a reduction to 15-20 people a day.

Deyalsingh said there was a misconception that public health facilities were not doing dengue testing.

He said to make a diagnosis, doctors at public health facilities take note of symptoms and take a complete blood count (CBC). If there was a need for further testing, a sample would be sent to the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) for a polymerase chain reaction (PCR) test. Rapid testing for dengue is not being used due to the unreliability of this test.

“What the public wants and what, unfortunately, some opposition members are talking about, is something called a rapid diagnostic test," Deyalsingh said.

“A rapid diagnostic test for dengue has its use but also its limitations, and it’s a very inaccurate test. It gives you a lot of false negatives. That is why we are not using it.”

Blake later addressed security concerns after NWRHA daily-paid employee Jamaal Watts was shot dead while working at the St James hospital compound on September 4.

“This requires a whole-of-government approach. North West is not incubated in a bubble. We exist in a demographic where crime exists. This is the reality of it.

“What we’ve done is to partner with the TTPS and other agencies such as the Defence Force to look at strategies that can be implemented at the RHA and at our other agencies to be able to fight the scourge of crime.”