Min­is­ter of Health Ter­rence Deyals­ingh is urg­ing the pub­lic, par­tic­u­lar­ly per­sons fre­quent­ing and liv­ing in forest­ed ar­eas to take the nec­es­sary pre­cau­tions to pro­tect them­selves against in­fec­tions from malar­ia. 

In a voice note from the Min­istry of Health on Thurs­day, Deyals­ingh re­port­ed that there were five cas­es of malar­ia which were iden­ti­fied as be­ing from a "well-de­fined ge­o­graph­ic area in South Trinidad."

He added that these cas­es were dis­cov­ered on March 27th and vec­tor con­trol meth­ods were rolled out, not­ing screen­ing showed that all per­sons af­fect­ed were dis­charged from the hos­pi­tal. 

Deyals­ingh, how­ev­er, stressed that per­sons who lived on or near forest­ed ar­eas or who vis­it­ed such lo­ca­tions for recre­ation or work should pro­tect them­selves from pos­si­bly con­tract­ing the ill­ness.

"For ex­am­ple, hunters, en­vi­ron­men­tal­ists, farm­ers, mem­bers of the pro­tec­tive ser­vices who go in­to our forests, es­pe­cial­ly in south Trinidad where we have dis­cov­ered this clus­ter.

"We ad­vise them to use the ap­pro­pri­ate pre­cau­tions, like wear­ing, long-sleeved, loose-fit­ting clothes.

"If you are liv­ing in and around those forest­ed ar­eas, please use a mos­qui­to net whilst you are sleep­ing and you can al­so use the ap­pro­pri­ate in­sect re­pel­lants, va­por­is­ers et cetera."

Deyals­ingh said malar­ia was not en­dem­ic to Trinidad and To­ba­go with al­most all cas­es be­ing im­port­ed from abroad. 

Malar­ia is a mos­qui­to-borne dis­ease caused by a par­a­site.