Covid19 surveillance testing starts in a week

From Monday the Ministry of Health will be able to ramp up covid19 testing across TT.

Health Minister Terrence Deyalsingh told the media during a virtual press conference on Monday that the ministry had received 1,750 extraction kits.

These are to be used in conjunction with the 4,000 testing kits given to TT by China and another 10,000 are expected to arrive in two weeks.

This week the ministry will begin training health officials in how to do covid19 tests.

He said, “Once they are trained we will have to spend time certifying the results we get from about 200 tests are compatible with CARPHA."

CARPHA, the Caribbean Public Health Agency, does all official testing of samples for covid 19. Once the test kits and extraction kits are validated, testing will begin. Surveillance testing will be done at one health centre in each county and will focus on people who go there with possible symptoms of the virus.

Only people who meet the clinical criteria for testing will be selected and offered the option of a test. People will not be tested through a walk-in process and not everyone with a cough will be tested.

Deyalsingh said TT expects to receive 10,000 complete testing kits with extraction kits in two weeks from the Pan American Health Organization,

He said the ministry aims to have 3,000-5,000 in preparation for the second and third waves of the virus.

Deyalsingh said PAHO had disregarded the use of rapid testing kits so TT will not be using them. This advice was shared during a meeting with ministers of health of the Americas on April 14. The meeting was hosted to discuss developments in the areas of diagnostics, therapeutics, and social distancing measures.

Epidemiologist Dr Avery Hinds said at the media conference that contract tracers have identified 715 people who had been in contact with covid19 patients. They have been contacted and their symptoms are being monitored.

He said, “Some of the contacts identified would have contributed to the persons tested. If anyone is symptomatic will be immediately tested.”

He pointed out that those identified as contacts do not live near the covid19 patients.

“Trinidad is a small place and anyone can be in contact with anyone else. Don’t take our current state for granted. It's important, with the work that has been done and the co-operation of the public, we maintain and renew focus and remain at home.”

As of Monday evening, TT has had 114 covid19 cases, eight deaths and 22 patients had been discharged.

There are 59 patients hospitalised at Couva and Caura Hospital. There are ten at Caura in a stable condition and 49 at Couva, with one patient in the high dependency.

There are 25 people at the Sangre Grande stepdown facility.

The eight covid19 fatalities were 55 and older with underlying conditions, Hinds revealed.