Press briefing on the COVID Community Engagement Project – November 17, 2021. (PMO)

Barbadians in home isolation are being urged to accept escalated care and transportation, when needed, to take them to isolation facilities, and those who don’t know their COVID-19 status should seek to do so.

Consultant Manager of Home Quarantine and a member of the Isolation and Home Quarantine Committee, Dr. Adanna Grandison, stated this during a press conference with COVID-19 Public Advisor, David Ellis, on Wednesday, which focused on the new COVID Community Engagement Project.

Noting that there were over 7,500 persons currently in community isolation, Dr. Grandison said that about 4,737 persons had been successfully discharged from the isolation programme, since it was implemented.

Stating that though there are persons who are complying with the regulations and accepting care, she stated: “With the increasing numbers, we continue to see that we do have some unfortunate persons who are either concerned or scared to have that escalation of care and to be transported because of the unknown at the facilities, which to a certain extent I can understand, and to address that we have a small cohort of medical assessors who will personally call these persons and speak with them.”

Adding that persons had become scared because of the many videos that have been circulating, she said after touring the Harrison’s Point Isolation Facility, she would be willing to go there, if she contracted COVID-19 because it is a nice facility.

“What we are seeing is that persons are sometimes scared into inertia to get the care that they need.  And I think that we really need to refocus to know what is the true enemy out there, and it is it is not our loved ones,” Dr. Grandison stated.

The Consultant Manager of Home Quarantine further noted that due to the number of people in home isolation, that it was paramount for persons to know their COVID status and for others to accept Government’s help.

She also disclosed that some of those persons who breached isolation, on investigation, were not intentionally or deliberately doing so, but would do so simply to find food, and the health officials had put plans in place to assist such persons who were in need.

“We have put measures in place to partner with the Ministry of People Empowerment, for instance, to provide food hampers to persons who we have identified as having needed that social support,” she said.

Dr. Grandison added that the number of persons who were found breaching isolation was no more than 50, and their actions have been brought to the attention of the COVID Monitoring Unit, which would “perform their investigations with an escalation as needed to the Royal Barbados Force, for further action”.

fabian.belgrave@barbados.gov.bb

Pin It on Pinterest