Rad­hi­ca De Sil­va

De­spite tor­ren­tial rains, hun­dreds of peo­ple came out at the mass vac­ci­na­tion site in San Fer­nan­do–South­ern Acad­e­my for the Per­form­ing Arts (SAPA), to get COVID-19 vac­ci­na­tions yes­ter­day.

And as vac­cines con­tin­ue to dwin­dle, of­fi­cials of the South West Re­gion­al Health Au­thor­i­ty (SWRHA) con­firmed that they had enough to do an­oth­er day of vac­ci­na­tions to­day.

With the high trans­mis­si­bil­i­ty of the virus ex­ac­er­bat­ed by the Brazil­ian vari­ant, many peo­ple in­ter­viewed yes­ter­day ex­pressed re­lief that they had re­ceived their vac­ci­na­tions.

Among them was Kir­ti Bala Bhi­ka, an In­di­an na­tion­al, who has been liv­ing in Trinidad for the past 50 years and her sis­ter Chan­dan Gowrie Parik, who was left strand­ed in T&T af­ter com­ing here last year to at­tend a wed­ding.

Bhi­ka said they made ap­point­ments and were called in to come for vac­ci­na­tions at 11 am.

She said with the COVID-19 cri­sis in the land of her birth, she felt for­tu­nate to get her vac­cines.

“In­dia has bad con­di­tions. Every­one feel­ing sor­ry for In­dia. I pray for God be­cause this thing is very ug­ly,” Bhi­ka said. She ex­plained that her sis­ter came to Trinidad last year to at­tend a wed­ding but was strand­ed af­ter the lock­down.

Parik has to get vac­ci­nat­ed be­fore she could re­turn to her res­i­dence in Eng­land.

Mean­while, 81-year-old Harold Prem­c­hand al­so said he felt good to be vac­ci­nat­ed. He was wheeled in­to the vac­ci­na­tion site in a wheel­chair. Oth­ers hob­bled us­ing walk­ers and crutch­es.

Prem­c­hand’s care­tak­er Vidya Su­ru­jbal­ly-Jankie said she was hop­ing to get vac­ci­nat­ed.

She said she made an ap­point­ment three days ago but was yet to re­ceive a re­sponse.

“I was a bit afraid to take it but then I re­al­ized that I have no choice be­cause of the num­ber of peo­ple who are get­ting it,” Su­ru­jbal­ly-Jankie said. Pol­lard Sci­pio said he had an ap­point­ment ear­li­er this week and was amazed when he got the call to come for his vac­cine.

Teams from the South West Re­gion­al Health Au­thor­i­ty have been vac­ci­nat­ing an av­er­age of 500 peo­ple per day but since Tues­day, all walk-in clients have been turned away.

Peo­ple, who are now mak­ing ap­point­ments, are be­ing giv­en dates in the last two weeks of May. Health Min­is­ter Ter­rence Deyals­ingh an­nounced on Thurs­day that 33,600 dos­es of the As­tra-Zeneca vac­cines will ar­rive in T&T on May 14. A to­tal of 1,041 peo­ple were vac­ci­nat­ed at the ten cen­tres in San Fer­nan­do.

↔—RAD­HI­CA DE SIL­VA