TECHNICAL Director of Epidemiology Dr Avery Hinds is urging travelling citizens to get vaccinated especially since the Delta variant of the Covid-19 virus was more transmissible.
He was speaking at the Ministry of Health’s virtual media conference on Tuesday.
The Delta variant had not yet been reported in Trinidad and Tobago.
Dr Hinds said, “The more vaccinations we get into arms and into people ahead of any potential introduction of a new variant the better off we will be of increasing the risk of spread.”
He said the virus was twice to four times more transmissible than the initial variant of the Covid-19 virus which could lead to higher spikes in cases in an unvaccinated population.
Dr Hinds said that both internationally and locally the most affected individuals in terms of severe illness and fatalities were the ones that were unvaccinated.
Quoting Chief Medical Officer Dr Roshan Parasram on the statistics presented last Saturday, Dr Hinds said mostly unvaccinated people were hospitalised.
He said, “There’s a small proportion of individuals that have had one vaccine so they are not fully vaccinated and among the seriously ill and the fatalities there have not been any fully vaccinated individuals.”
And Dr Hinds urged the general population to get vaccinated in the event that the Delta variant was to present itself in Trinidad and Tobago.
Begs the question again — why are vaccinated travelers still allowed to enter the country without any days isolation, quarantine, nor post arrival PCR test.
They mentioned that in their experience, the 72hrs pre travel negative PCR test resulted, in about 1% cases upon arrival in country. — That was based PRE-DELTA.
So, now with the much more transmissible Delta, the math is not the same.
MoH should amend the entry protocols.