WESTERN BUREAU:
DR FRANCINE Phillips-Kelly, the medical officer of health for St James, is urging fresh caution and renewed vigilance in preventing COVID-19 spread and infection, as 15 positive cases of the disease have been confirmed in the parish since the start of the year up to January 11.
Phillips-Kelly sounded the warning while addressing Thursday’s monthly meeting of the St James Municipal Corporation (StJMC), where she noted that the parish’s number of confirmed COVID-19 cases so far in January are close to the total number recorded in December.
“Fewer persons are testing, but of the numbers tested, at least 50 per cent of them are found to be positive with COVID-19. What we have noted for January is that, since the beginning of January up to yesterday (Wednesday January 11), we have had 15 positive cases compared to December, where, for the entire month we had 18 cases, so having not gotten halfway to January, we have almost eclipsed December’s total,” said Phillips-Kelly.
NEW VARIANT
“There has been a moderate increase in the number of cases of COVID-19, so we therefore encourage vigilance as the colder times of the year tend to be more pronounced in terms of the COVID virus. We continue to vaccinate, and we have locations both in our central sites, as well as the peripheral sites, and we still have the Pfizer, Johnson & Johnson, and Sinopharm vaccines, plus booster vaccines are available for those persons who qualify,” Phillips-Kelly added.
According to the Ministry of Health and Wellness, up to January 9, St James had recorded 17,619 COVID-19 cases overall since 2020, the third highest number of cases per parish behind Kingston and St Andrew’s 40,798 cases and St Catherine’s 27,441 cases.
Up to January 11, there have been 1,508,319 COVID-19 vaccine doses administered across Jamaica, with 718,078 of those being first doses, 618,168 being second doses, and 126,475 being single doses. There have also been 41,116 booster shots administered.
Phillips-Kelly also noted that while there have been no reported local cases of the new Omicron XBB.1.5 variant of COVID-19, St James’ health authorities continue to maintain vigilance in terms of testing, particularly at all ports of entry.
“The information that we have is that there is a new variant, and while we have not seen it on our shores, we continue to be vigilant in respect of our ports as well as all persons with respiratory illnesses being sampled (tested for COVID-19). Sometimes individuals are resistant to these samplings, as some persons will not turn up for sampling, but we continue to encourage sampling,” said Phillips-Kelly.
“We continue to maintain surveillance for our communicable and non-communicable diseases, the most crucial one at this point still happens to be COVID-19, for which we still have a high positivity rate,” Phillips-Kelly added. “The vaccination sites offered in our central sites are at Catherine Hall on Thursdays, and the Type V facility on Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Saturdays. The peripheral sites at John’s Hall and Mt Carey have the fourth Tuesday of each month for availability of vaccines.”
christopher.thomas@gleanerjm.com