GEISHA KOW­LESSAR-ALON­ZO

As the num­ber of COVID-19 cas­es and deaths con­tin­ue to climb, vi­rol­o­gist Pro­fes­sor Christo­pher Oura is warn­ing that if cit­i­zens do not play their part in flat­ten­ing the curve, then this coun­try can pos­si­bly lose the fight to the COVID-19 virus as re­cent­ly seen in the case of In­dia.

Yes­ter­day, T&T record­ed 233 new cas­es and eight deaths, the lat­er be­ing the high­est num­ber of deaths dur­ing a 24-hour pe­ri­od. There have been 42 deaths for the first nine days of this month and an over­all to­tal of 211 deaths.

Oura not­ed that last Fri­day the US Cen­ters for Dis­ease Con­trol and Pre­ven­tion (CDC) recog­nised that SARS-CoV-2, the virus that caus­es COVID-19, is air­borne and can be trans­mit­ted via res­pi­ra­to­ry flu­ids, which are fine droplets re­leased dur­ing res­pi­ra­tion.

Re­vis­ing its pub­lic guide­lines on COVID-19, the top US med­ical body mod­i­fied the list­ed modes of SARS-CoV-2 trans­mis­sion to com­prise the prob­a­bil­i­ty of the virus be­ing air­borne.

“Peo­ple re­lease res­pi­ra­to­ry flu­ids dur­ing ex­ha­la­tion (e.g, qui­et breath­ing, speak­ing, singing, ex­er­cise, cough­ing, sneez­ing) in the form of droplets across a spec­trum of sizes. These droplets car­ry virus and trans­mit in­fec­tion,” the up­dat­ed guide­lines on the CDC’s web­site not­ed.

Speak­ing to Guardian Me­dia Ltd from the UK Oura said while the Health Min­istry “can ad­vice, rec­om­mend and man­date cer­tain things” at the end of the day “it’s the peo­ple who need to fol­low the rules.”

“If the peo­ple of Trinidad and To­ba­go do not fol­low the rules; if they con­tin­ue to mix house­holds, get up close and con­gre­gate then this virus is go­ing to car­ry on spread­ing so it’s a mat­ter of not just the Gov­ern­ment.

“If peo­ple don’t ad­here to the mea­sures we will lose this and we have seen what’s hap­pen­ing in coun­tries around the world like In­dia. It is re­al­ly im­por­tant now with the num­ber of cas­es and the deaths (in T&T) that we flat­ten this peak,” Oura said.

The CDC al­so not­ed that while in­fec­tions through in­hala­tion at dis­tances greater than six feet from an in­fec­tious source are not as like­ly, an in­fec­tious per­son breath­ing out the virus in­doors for a pro­longed pe­ri­od of time can re­sult in con­cen­tra­tion of the virus in the air, which may then in­fect peo­ple who are even six feet away.

“This is the ev­i­dence that has come up over time, that these very small droplets can be sus­pend­ed in the air and they can move so in some cas­es they can move more than six feet away. It’s not as com­mon. The ma­jor­i­ty of risk is with­in the two me­tres but there is proof that be­yond that two me­tres, be­yond that six feet there is a small risk those small droplets will pass that dis­tance and will be able to in­fect some­body,”Oura ex­plained.

Apart from the reg­u­lar wash­ing and sani­ti­sa­tion of hands, warn­ing of masks and so­cial dis­tanc­ing, Oura said prop­er ven­ti­la­tion is crit­i­cal in homes and busi­ness­es.

“What we do need to em­pha­sis from the CDC’s in­for­ma­tion is we need to re­mem­ber ven­ti­la­tion is im­por­tant in closed spaces and in air-con­di­tion­ing rooms.

“We have to take in­to con­sid­er­a­tion there is a risk be­yond two me­tres un­der cer­tain cir­cum­stances es­pe­cial­ly when you’re in­doors and when there’s no ven­ti­la­tion so peo­ple have to be aware there is a risk. For ex­am­ple if a per­son who was trans­mit­ting the virus through sneezes and coughs was in a room for like 15 min­utes and then they left the room and some­body else came in­to the room 15 min­utes lat­er there may well be those small droplets still sus­pend­ed in the air. Not on­ly do we need to take the masks in­to con­sid­er­a­tion but al­so the ven­ti­la­tion,” Oura em­pha­sised.

He said the ma­jor­i­ty of risk is still with­in that two me­tre dis­tance but not­ed that the virus is po­ten­tial­ly air borne “every where.”

“When we speak and even breath a cer­tain amount of droplets come out of our mouths and nose and that gets pro­ject­ed in­to the air and the larg­er droplets we pro­duce fall to the ground very quick­ly with­in a short space and the go on to sur­face.

“But there are and there has been ev­i­dence re­cent­ly over time that there are some small­er droplets that are able to be sus­pend­ed in the air for longer pe­ri­ods of time that they, as the large droplets have virus on them so if they are breath in we have a dan­ger of be­ing in­fect­ed,” Oura said.

Say­ing that the air­borne spread “ is noth­ing re­al­ly new” Oura said peo­ple need to un­der­stand that this virus is spread usu­al­ly with­in a rel­a­tive­ly short dis­tance- two me­tres.

“But al­so crit­i­cal­ly it (the virus) can sit around in the air for longer on those small­er droplets so we have to be aware that the things we have been told to do do not change at all be­cause masks stop or sig­nif­i­cant­ly re­duce those droplets from be­ing re­leased from the mouth and they sig­nif­i­cant­ly re­duce those droplets from go­ing in­to our mouths,”Oura added.