Two more males and a female who tested positive for the novel coronavirus (COVID-19) have died. 
According to the Health Ministry on Sunday, this now takes the total number of deaths from the pandemic in Guyana to 512.
These latest fatalities are a 41-year-old female from Region Three (Essequibo Islands-West Demerara), who died on July 16; a 65-year-old male from Region Five (Mahaica-Berbice), who died on July 15, and an 82-year-old male from Region Six (East Berbice-Corentyne), who died on July 17.
The Ministry said these patients were admitted with COVID-19 like symptoms but died while receiving care at medical institutions across the country. It was noted that samples were taken at the time of admission, which subsequently returned positive tests.
With these fatalities, the COVID-19 death toll for the month of July has gone up to 42. May is the deadliest month since the outbreak of the virus in Guyana with 99 fatalities, followed by 78 deaths recorded in June.
New cases
Meanwhile, 91 persons have tested positive for COVID-19 from some 1227 tests conducted over the last 24 hours.
The total number of confirmed cases in Guyana is now 21,562, according to the Ministry’s updated COVID-19 dashboard on Sunday.
Of these, however, only 1216 cases are currently active including 13 patients in the COVID-19 Intensive Care Unit (ICU) and the remaining 1203 persons in isolation, that is, 98 in institutional isolation and the other 1105 in home isolation.
There is also one other person in institutional quarantine.
On the other hand, some 19,834 persons have recovered from the life-threatening disease – 29 more recoveries than the figure reported the day before.
Since the outbreak of the pandemic in Guyana last year, 209,894 persons have been tested for the novel coronavirus of which 11,033 females and 10,529 males were positive cases.
A breakdown of 91 new cases detected on Sunday showed that three were from the Essequibo Islands-West Demerara region, 29 cases in Region Four (Demerara-Mahaica), seven from Region Five, 19 more from the East-Berbice Corentyne region, a whopping 31 cases from Region Nine (Upper Takutu-Upper Essequibo) and the other two cases from Region 10 (Upper Demerara-Berbice).
There were no new cases recorded in Regions One (Barima-Waini), Two (Pomeroon-Supenaam), Seven (Cuyuni-Mazaruni) and Eight (Potaro-Siparuni) in the last 24 hours, according to Sunday’s COVID-19 dashboard.
In order to curb the spread of the deadly virus in the country, the Guyana Government launched its COVID-19 vaccination exercise back in February and is aggressively rolling it out in the various regions in order to achieve heard immunity.
Recent figures show that over 241,000 persons have received their first dose of the vaccine, representing some 49.6 per cent of the adult population. Meanwhile, fully immunised persons in the country stand at more than 126,000, that is, approximately 26 per cent of persons 18 years and older.
Persons are encouraged to get immunised since the COVID-19 vaccine gives full protection against death. In fact, health authorities have disclosed that no one who is fully vaccinated with both doses of the COVID-19 vaccines have been hospitalised or died from the virus.
