…353 new cases recorded
Another woman who tested positive for the novel coronavirus (COVID-19) has died, according to the Health Ministry on Sunday.
This latest fatality is a 65-year-old female from Region Four (Demerara-Mahaica), who died on Sunday. She was fully vaccinated, the Ministry said.
With this, the total number of deaths in Guyana from the pandemic has gone up to 1166. 
Over the past week, there was a staggering 32 fatalities recorded; consequently, taking the COVID-19 death toll for the month of January to 111.
Meanwhile, there were 353 new infections detected within a 24-hour period.
According to the Health Ministry’s updated COVID-19 dashboard on Sunday, the total number of confirmed cases in Guyana has gone up to 59,803.
Of this, however, only 11,543 are currently active cases. This includes 16 patients in the COVID-19 Intensive Care Unit (ICU) and the remaining 11,527 persons are in isolation, that is, 203 in institutional isolation and the remaining 11,324 in home isolation.
There are another six persons are also in institutional quarantine, according to the dashboard.
Additionally, some 47,094 persons have recovered from the life-threatening disease to date.
Since the outbreak of COVID-19 in the country, approximately 506,813 persons have been tested so far and of this, some 27,664 males and 32,139 females were found to be positive.
Of the 353 new cases reported on Sunday, one was from Region One (Barima-Waini), 27 cases from Region Two (Pomeroon-Supenaam), 46 from the Essequibo Islands-West Demerara region, a whopping 200 cases from the Demerara-Mahaica region, six from Region Five (Mahaica-Berbice), another 31 from Region Six (East Berbice-Corentyne), 18 each from Regions Eight (Potaro-Siparuni) and Region Nine (Upper Takutu-Upper Essequibo), and the remaining six cases from Region 10 (Upper Demerara-Berbice).
There were no new cases recorded in Region Seven (Cuyuni-Mazaruni) within the 24-hour period.
Health authorities have attributed the rapid rise in COVID-19 cases over the past several weeks to the Omicron variant, which though not deadly is highly transmissible.
As such, persons are being urged to get vaccinated, and for those who are qualified to get their booster shots, in order to add a layer of protection against the virus.
So far, over 422,700 adults or 82.4 per cent have taken a first dose while 73.8 per cent of persons 18 and over are fully immunised.
For children between the age of 12 to 17, some 22,800 or 31.3 per cent are completely vaccinated.
Meanwhile, over 37,500 persons have taken their booster dose.
But as more people continue to get vaccinated, authorities are urging the public to continue observing all COVID-19 preventative measures, particularly masking in public, social distancing and frequent hand washing and sanitising – which are more significant now with the rapidly-spreading Omicron variant.
According to the World Health Organisation (WHO) recent figures, some 364,191,494 confirmed cases were reported globally along with 5,631,457 deaths.
The WHO also reported that in the Region of the Americas, that is, Latin America and the Caribbean, the number of confirmed COVID-19 cases has increased to 132,400,000 while the death toll in the region has gone up to 2,489,629.
As it relates to vaccination against COVID-19, a total of 9,854,237,363 doses have been administered worldwide. (G8)
