BASSETERRE, St.Kitts (Friday 21st May 2021)-  Contacts of the latest COVID-19 case in the federation have reportedly been reaching out to the health officials, and those who practice health measures have gotten negative results so far involving the only active case thus far of the 46 recorded in total here in St.Kitts-Nevis.

Such details was gleaned from the presentation of the Chief Medical Officer Dr. Hazel Laws when she spoke at the National Emergency Operations Center (NEOC) COVID-19 Daily Briefing on Thursday 20th May 2021, advising that “this latest case is probably the first in a cluster of cases, and so at present the public health team is engaged in robust contact tracing. So a case of this nature, the natural trigger is contact tracing.”

Dr. Laws said 20 contacts have been identified and over 100 samples being processed from the contact tracing. As gathered the results of the exercise will “dictate the way forward” on this public health matter.

“Based on the latest case, the public health team would have identified over twenty (20) possible close contacts of this case and I want to reassure the public that all these 20 persons have been placed in quarantine and their nasopharyngeal swab has been taken, the samples are being processed at the medical laboratory,” she told.

The CMO shared that the individual who is a national without a travel history and who works in the housekeeping department at a local hotel, is in stable condition and is in isolation. Additionally, the individual is not vaccinated. This media house understands the patient is a female who hails from St.Kitts.

According to her: “The team is at work as we speak at the local hotel testing, testing, testing. Over a hundred samples being processed from this exercise alone. We are awaiting results and the contact tracing exercise continues
Dr. Laws pointed out that essential public health acts that have proven to contain and prevent COVID-19.

“So when we’ve called individuals or those who would have made contact with the case, the first question [we ask] ‘Did you have on your mask?, Did you have a hand sanitizer? What was the distance/ How close were you when you interacted with the individual? So these are the protective measures and they work. For those individuals who wore their mask, who had hand sanitizers, who maintained that distance, their results are already coming back negative so these public health measures work.”

“We have to continue and maintain these preventative measures,” the CMO encouraged.

Dr. Laws explained that contact tracing is the process by which “we identify, assess or evaluate and manage persons who may have been exposed to the COVID-19 virus and the aim is to prevent onward transmission. When this process is systematically applied, the hope and the aim is to break means of transmission and to contain this wave or a possible wave of COVID-19 infection.”

“We’ve been getting a number of calls in terms of individuals who may have had contact with this case.

She highlighted that a contact is a person who has had any one of the following exposures to a probable or confirmed case- face to face interaction with a confirmed case within one meter having interacted with the individual one meter apart and for a duration of 15 minutes or over or direct physical contact with this individual meaning shook hands, hugged, kissed or direct physical touching between oneself and the individual.

BASSETERRE, St.Kitts (Friday 21st May 2021)-Medical Chief of Staff at the Joseph N. France General Hospital Dr. Cameron Wilkinson is of the view that the announcement of the latest COVID-19 case should serve as a wakeup call for individuals who are not vaccinated.

He made the disclosure while speaking at the National Emergency Operations Center (NEOC) COVID-19 Daily Briefing on Wednesday 19th May 2021 following the announcement by his National COVID-19 Task Force colleague Chief Medical Officer Dr. Hazel Laws.

 “The Federation just confirmed its latest case of COVID-19 case 46 being a national who does not have travel history. The individual works in the hotel industry.  The case is stable and is in isolation as we speak,” the CMO revealed.
Dr. Wilkinson recalled that the national vaccination programme started on 22nd February this year.

“Despite significant vaccine hesitancy to date 14,747 persons came forward and received their first dose bringing us to 44.6% of the target population. We also now have 4,572 persons who are now fully vaccinated or 13.8% of the target population. I congratulate them all for doing the right thing in not just protecting themselves but protecting others. That number could have and should have been higher.  We called for an all of society approach in this fight and many stepped forward to aid in this fight and encouraged persons to come forward and get vaccinated. Some said that they had no reason to get vaccinated as we had no COVID,” Dr. Wilkinson said then.

Dr. Wilkinson continued: “Well I want to make it abundantly clear that the virus is back. You heard that we had a positive case who had no history of travel. We also had since February 22nd, a tool to fight this deadly virus, the Oxford/AstraZeneca vaccine. This vaccine is 70% effective in preventing COVID-19. This vaccine is 76% effective in preventing severe disease and hospitalization after a single dose. This vaccine is 82.4% effective in preventing severe disease and hospitalization after two doses. This vaccine is 100% effective in preventing death from COVID-19.”

“We said that you needed to get vaccinated to protect yourself and those who could not be vaccinated and were dependent on you. That is the very young, those below the age of 18 and the very old and frail.For those of us who did the right thing and got vaccinated we should benefit from the protection offered by the vaccine,” he pointed out.

According to Dr. Wilkinson: “This positive case should, however, serve as a wakeup call for all. It should be a wakeup call for all those who were hesitating. It should be a wakeup call for those who knew better but refused to encourage others to step forward and get vaccinated. It should be a wakeup call for those who knowingly spread fake news and false information about the vaccines and prevented others from stepping forward.  It should be a wakeup call for those who silently took the vaccine and chose not to share the information with others so that they can benefit from protection. We have said no one is safe unless everyone is safe.”

Having made the announcement of a new active case, Dr. Laws touched on the “importance of the COVID-19 vaccine that we are administering at this time and the COVID-19 prevention and control measures.”

Hand sanitation, wearing face masks when in public space and the importance of physical distancing,  making sure that you maintain a six feet distance  when in public space also and social distancing avoiding crowds at this time were listed by her.

“These measures are very, very important at this time,” the CMO stated.
Notably, close to the end of work day that Wednesday, 19, 320 vaccine doses were administered (St.Kitts-14,433 and Nevis-4,887), according to information shared by Dr. Laws at another briefing held the next day (20th May).