GLOOMY COVID FORECAST
Virus poised to rattle Ja, says UTech professor
DR ALVERSTON Bailey, professor of Occupational Health and Safety at the University of Technology (UTech), is painting a dark picture as it relates to the COVID-19 pandemic locally, saying the spikes of recent weeks are just little rumblings compared to what he thinks is looming on the horizon.
The clinical toxicologist’s daunting forecast comes even as Jamaica recorded 141 positive COVID-19 cases in the last 24 hours. This brings the total cases on record for the country to 2,011. Over the same period, recoveries increased by 42, bringing total recoveries to 888, a 44.2 per cent recovery rate.
The country is now managing 1,032 active cases including 12 moderately ill patients and four critically ill patients.
“There was a misinterpretation of the positive cases in April. The real spike is going to come in October. By then we will have a similar situation to what happened in New York,” predicted Bailey in an interview with The Gleaner.
Bailey is of the view that the local health system, which is already under pressure, will come under serious stress in October when he expects to see a dramatic increase in the number of COVID-19 cases.
“The largest hospital in the Caribbean, the University Hospital of the West Indies (UHWI) is out of bed space for COVID-19 patients,”said Bailey.“What is going to happen to smaller hospitals when the spike which is moving vertically reaches the end of October.”
Bailey also commented on the increase in the number of health workers who have been exposed to persons with the virus and had become sick.
“At Cornwall Regional Hospital, health workers are putting the health of themselves and their families at risk. They have decided to continue working despite the rationing of personal protective equipment (PPE) at the hospital,” said Bailey.
However, when contacted, Errol Greene, regional director of the Western Regional Authority, told The Gleaner that he is unaware of any rationing of PPE.
“I do not know about rationing of [PPE], it is being managed. An example is the N95 mask. We do not have an inexhaustible amount so we have to manage what we have.”
GENERAL ELECTION
Bailey is also taking issue with the decision to have a general election at a time when the nation is struggling to come to grips with a spike in the highly contagious respiratory illness.
“The misdiagnosis of the pandemic influenced the calling of elections now and more politicians are going to come down with the virus,” said Bailey.
Meanwhile, health workers in at least four health centres in St Catherine, Clarendon, St Elizabeth and St Ann say they are worried the increase in COVID-19 cases, if not cauterised, will overwhelm primary health care across the island. Already, nurses are feeling the pressure. Registered nurse Samantha Brown (name changed to protect her identity), who works at a health centre in one Portmore community, said there are already signs that the situation is becoming untenable.
She said fear is openly being expressed by fellow health workers as the prospects for contagion grow with each passing day.
“While Government has done some things right early on, I now feel that as a country, we have lost the plot and because of that, as a nurse, I am worried,” Brown said.
Permanent Secretary in the Ministry of Health Dunstan Bryan, when contacted, referred The Gleaner to Chief Medical Officer (CMO) Jacquiline Bisasor-McKenzie.
Attempts to get a comment on the matter from the CMO also proved futile, as it was said that she was engaged in a meeting.
Speaking to Radio Jamaica news yesterday, President of the Nurses Association of Jamaica Carmen Johnson said that nurses have expressed fear of burnout, as pressure builds in dealing with the spike in COVID-19 cases among other routine duties.
Johnson said she is concerned about the number of nurses being exposed to the virus. At present, the NAJ president said that 10 nurses have contracted the virus and more than 50 are now in quarantine. She noted that it is affecting the delivery of service in the public health system.
“Our biggest challenge is the exposure of our nurses and other health workers because we are aware that persons are coming into the facilities, who did not come in for COVID but end up being COVID positive,” said Johnson.
In recent weeks, St Catherine, Kingston and St Andrew, St Thomas and Clarendon have borne the brunt of the latest spike, prompting Prime Minister Andrew Holness to revise curfew hours in those parishes.
Georgette Bryce (name also changed), who has spent 13 years working in the primary health sector in Clarendon, spoke of being afraid to go to work.
“Sometimes I just do not want to go to work. I am so afraid because I have a really bad asthma situation and my daughter who is four now has a respiratory illness,”Bryce said.