By Chantalé Fletcher
HYPERTENSION and diabetes continue to be the most common comorbidities amongst the fatalities in Covid-19 patients.
Asthma, Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD), Ischemic Heart Disease (IHD) and Malignancy which are different types of cancers were also common, but less frequently reported.
Epidemiologist Dr Avery Hinds during the Ministry of Health virtual presser on Wednesday said that the percentages in comorbidities amongst men were higher than women.
Dr Hinds stated, “An overall of 77% persons who passed away would have had one comorbidity or another.”
He emphasised that there were also persons without comorbidities in both the older and younger age groups.
Dr Hinds said the absence of a comorbidity does not mean that signs of infection should be ignored.
He added that were a wide range of other factors.
Using graphs, Dr Hinds said, “In the other column, 72.6% people reported one or other wide range of comorbidities which is a pre-occurring factor, in addition, persons who passed on experienced pre-existing illness.”
He added, “That here was a decrease in male fatalities from the 75 % to just 60.7%; while there were 39.3 % female fatalities which the majority were in the over 60-age group.”
“So not knowing you have comorbidity is not the same as having one,” he said adding that everyone should take the necessary precautions to avoid illness.
Dr Hinds also informed the public that as of Tuesday, the total occupancy of the healthcare parallel system was 54% with the wards at the Intensive Care Unit (ICU) being at 50% capacity and the High Dependency Unit (HDU) at 88%.
He said that the overall occupancy over the past seven days hoovered between 54% and 60 %, while the ICU and HDU remained above 75%, in four of the seven centers that provide clinical care.
He said in epidemiological week 22, “There were fewer cases accumulated with a 10% drop; while the end of week 23 showed 30% drop in cumulative cases over the seven day period,” in comparison to the previous week.
And while Covid-19 deaths were being reported with the number being 686 up to Tuesday evening, Dr Hinds said it may not be the primary reason in some cases.
Referring to the younger age group brackets, Dr Hinds said, “ Was Covid-19 the underlying cause of death in all of them, not always in that we have opted to count all deaths with Covid-19 among the Covid-19 statistics even some that may show up in the system with other issues that may have contributed to their demise.”
And he added that there was not yet enough collected information that was collated to show the breakdown in Covid-19 cases by nationality and once the information was sufficiently completed, it will be shared.
