Guyana records 268th COVID-19 death, 120 new cases

…some 500,000 citizens eligible for vaccine

The Health Ministry on Saturday revealed that another person succumbed to the novel coronavirus, moving the death toll to 268.
An 81-year-old female from Region Four (Demerara-Mahaica) is the latest fatality. She died on April 16 while receiving care at a medical facility.
One day prior, four persons reportedly succumbed. They were an 81-year-old female from Region Three (Essequibo Islands-West Demerara), an 81-year-old female from Region Six (East Berbice-Corentyne); and two men from Region Four, aged 46 and 64.
Another 120 cases were confirmed on Saturday, raising the total confirmed positives to 11,762. However, active cases are 1332. These emerged after 1574 samples were collected and sent for testing.
In the medical facilities, 13 patients are in the Intensive Care Unit, 75 in institutional isolation, 21 in institutional quarantine and 1244 in home isolation. Some 10,161 of the 5952 males and 5810 females have recovered completely. To date, Guyana has tested 107,093 individuals.

New cases
A breakdown of new cases showed that seven were detected in Region Two (Pomeroon-Supenaam); 31 in Region Three (Essequibo Islands-West Demerara); 62 in Region Four (Demerara-Mahaica); four in Region Five (Mahaica-Berbice); three in Region Six (East Berbice-Corentyne); one in Region Seven (Cuyuni-Mazaruni) and two in Region Nine (Upper Takutu-Upper Essequibo).
Cases in Regions One (Barima-Waini), Eight (Potaro-Siparuni) and 10 (Upper Demerara-Berbice) still stand at 1035; 247 and 802.

Vaccine
During the latest coronavirus update, Health Minister Dr Frank Anthony expressed that only the adult population is being vaccinated, since trials were not done for children. This translates to 500,000 of the local population.
“Because these vaccines are not available to children, we would have to take them out of the equation. None of these vaccines; the clinical trials were not done so we’re not using it in the 18 and below population. If we remove those persons, we’re probably looking at about 500,000 persons,” he outlined.
For this, Government is actively seeking to have enough vaccines to immunise this subset of people. Presently, more vaccines are needed to reach herd immunity.
“We aiming to get to herd immunity as close as possible and while we’re still a little short in terms of how much more we need, we continue to tirelessly pursue acquiring vaccines so that every adult in Guyana would be able to get vaccine.”
Right now, Region Nine is leading the vaccination campaign while there has been a slothful uptake in Region 10 (Upper Takutu-Upper Essequibo).
On Friday, the public was reassured that the vaccines are safe and testimony is the thousands of people who would have taken their shots without any complications.
“The Ministry wishes to state clearly that the COVID-19 vaccines being administered are safe. We are hopeful influential political, faith and business leaders in Region Ten and other parts of the country will use their good offices to encourage citizens to get vaccinated,” the Ministry said in a statement.
All Guyanese aged 18 and older were encouraged to visit a vaccination site in their community and get inoculated as soon as possible.