The fol­low­ing is the lat­est COVID-19 Up­date from the Min­istry of Health...

TRINIDAD AND TO­BA­GO COVID-19 (NOV­EL CORO­N­AVIRUS) UP­DATE #76

As part of the na­tion­al dri­ve to safe­guard the health of the Trinidad and To­ba­go pop­u­la­tion in the face of the glob­al COVID-19 out­break, the Min­istry of Health con­tin­ues to pro­vide up-to-date in­for­ma­tion on the coun­try’s sta­tus in this re­gard. 

As of the morn­ing of Sun­day April 5th, 2020, the Min­istry re­ports the fol­low­ing:

797 = Num­ber of sam­ples sub­mit­ted to the Caribbean Pub­lic Health Agency (CARPHA) for test­ing for COVID-19

104 = Num­ber of sam­ples which have test­ed pos­i­tive 

7 = Num­ber of deaths 

1= Num­ber of per­sons dis­charged

The Min­istry of Health pro­vides the fol­low­ing up­date:

*  One ad­di­tion­al per­son has test­ed pos­i­tive for COVID-19—pend­ing epi­demi­o­log­i­cal in­ves­ti­ga­tion.

*  One ad­di­tion death in To­ba­go has been con­firmed—el­der­ly male with pre-ex­ist­ing med­ical con­di­tion.

Of the to­tal num­ber of pos­i­tive cas­es, 49 of these pos­i­tive cas­es came from the group of na­tion­als who re­cent­ly re­turned from a cruise:

*  46 pos­i­tive cas­es from the group of 68 na­tion­als who re­turned from the cruise to­geth­er

*  3 pos­i­tive cas­es from the group of na­tion­als who re­turned from the same cruise sep­a­rate­ly from the oth­er 68 na­tion­als.

The Min­istry of Health re­minds the pub­lic that COVID-19 can be spread by touch­ing sur­faces that are con­t­a­m­i­nat­ed with the nov­el coro­n­avirus. It is im­por­tant to reg­u­lar­ly sani­tise com­mon­ly touched sur­faces (e.g. ta­ble-tops, handrails, door­knobs and trol­leys).  If dirty, they should be cleaned us­ing a de­ter­gent or soap and wa­ter pri­or to sani­ti­sa­tion.  A sim­ple so­lu­tion of 1/3 cup of house­hold bleach to one gal­lon of wa­ter is quite ef­fec­tive.

The im­por­tant el­e­ments of sani­ti­sa­tion are dis­in­fect­ing fre­quent­ly and thor­ough­ly, and us­ing the clean­ing prod­uct cor­rect­ly.

The pub­lic is al­so strong­ly ad­vised to take the fol­low­ing per­son­al hy­giene mea­sures to pro­tect them­selves and their loved ones from COVID-19:

*   Wash your hands prop­er­ly with soap and wa­ter

     -   Use an al­co­hol-based hand sani­tis­er if wa­ter and soap are not avail­able

*   Cov­er your nose and mouth with a tis­sue when you cough or sneeze

     -   Dis­pose of tis­sue im­me­di­ate­ly af­ter us­ing

     -   Cough and sneeze in­to the crook of your el­bow if you do not have a tis­sue

*   Avoid touch­ing your face

*   Stay home if you are ill

*   Avoid close con­tact with peo­ple who have flu-like symp­toms

*   Prac­tise so­cial dis­tanc­ing

     -   No kiss­ing, hug­ging or hand­shak­ing, and avoid un­nec­es­sary gath­er­ings

     -   Main­tain at least 2 me­tres (ap­prox­i­mate­ly 6 feet) dis­tance be­tween your­self and oth­ers, es­pe­cial­ly any­one who is cough­ing or show­ing signs of flu-like ill­ness.

Ad­di­tion­al­ly, all pub­lic trans­porta­tion ve­hi­cles should op­er­ate with win­dows open and lim­it their oc­cu­pan­cy by 50 per­cent.

The Min­istry will con­tin­ue to pro­vide ac­cu­rate in­for­ma­tion to the pub­lic in a time­ly fash­ion.

The pub­lic is there­fore urged to dis­re­gard and avoid shar­ing all un­con­firmed, mis­lead­ing and/or false in­for­ma­tion about COVID-19 (for­mer­ly Nov­el Coro­n­avirus).