10 new COVID-19 cases recorded

The Health Ministry has reported 10 new coronavirus cases in the country as of Thursday. Testing has continued on a rapid scale, with 1,193 samples being processed in one day.
The dashboard showed a total of 63,339 confirmed cases in Guyana in March 2020, which translates to 29,180 males and 34,219 females. Deaths have not increased from 1228.
With zero patients being treated in the Intensive Care Unit (ICU), seven are in institutional isolation, 83 are in home isolation and nine are in institutional quarantine. A remarkable 62,081 recoveries have been made. Across facilities, 587,994 tests have been conducted to date.
This week’s vaccination statistics show that some 439,306 persons, or 85.6 per cent of the adult population, have received the first dose of a COVID vaccine; while 338,438 persons, or 66 per cent of those 18 years and older, have been fully vaccinated.
For the 12-to-17 age group, some 34,435 persons, or 47.2 per cent of them, have received a first jab, while 25,194 persons, or 34.5 per cent of them, have returned for their second dose. As it relates to booster doses, a total of 61,042 COVID-19 shots have been administered.
Uptake has remained low within the past months, and now there is the possibility that some vaccines would have to be discarded due to impending expiration.
Health Minister Dr Frank Anthony has already urged persons this week to get vaccinated before the doses in stock expire, in order to prevent wastage. The country has supplies of Sinopharm, AstraZeneca, Johnson and Johnson (J&J), and Pfizer vaccines. The Sinopharm vaccines will not expire until 2023, but the others are due to expire much sooner.
In the latest COVID update on Wednesday, Dr Anthony has been quoted as saying, “We have adequate COVID-19 vaccines. We have adequate storage. You would recall that when we were preparing for these vaccines, we spent a lot of money to develop storage capacity for these vaccines. The vaccines vary in the temperature you ought to keep them, so some of them require refrigeration at
-70°C. At the time when we were looking for the vaccines, we did not have that capacity, but we built that capacity.”
If anyone is displaying any of the symptoms associated with COVID-19, or needs any additional information, that person is asked to contact the COVID-19 Hotlines: 231-1166, 226-7480 or 624-6674 immediately, or visit www. health.gov.gy.
Global figures show that almost 503 million people have tested positive for the virus, and 6.2 million have died. In the Americas, more than 152 confirmed cases have been reported, with more than 2.7 million deaths. (G12)