Saturday 21st  March 2020   -   Illaro Court, Barbados.

Barbados At Stage 2 Of COVID-19 Preparedness Plan.

COVID-19 update from Ilaro Court featuring Health Minister, Lieutenant Colonel, Jeffrey Bostic ( at RIGHT  ); Chief Medical Officer (Ag) ( at LEFT ) , Dr. Anton Best and COVID-19 Czar, Richard Carter. (PMO) ( at PODIUM) )

      

   The new eight cases include seven as a result of contact tracing, and one is a visitor to Barbados.

Making the announcement during this evening's national update was the Minister of Health and Wellness Jeffrey Bostic at Ilaro Court.

Of the 14 cases, Acting Chief Medical Officer Dr Anton Best revealed that it is nine women and five men. He stressed that the seven out of eight persons confirmed were due to contact tracing which is essential to containing the spread of contagions like the virus that causes this novel coronavirus.

Minister Bostic said the government and Ministry "expected and anticipated the increase in the number of cases", but praised the teams' efforts to "identify, locate and treat" the persons who would have come into contact with those already infected.

Speaking about the infected 14, Dr Best said that all persons will be in isolation. The six previously confirmed patients are in isolation and "all are doing well. No one is gravely ill, all are mildly ill at this point." However, he stressed that the other eight will also go into isolation immediately because the fact is "they can deteriorate at any time" so isolation is to facilitate monitoring and management.

Barbados' isolation centre can accommodate 46 persons.

Barbados has now moved from Stage 1 to Stage 2 since transmission has been from person to person on island, confirmed through contact tracing.

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Acting Chief Medical Officer Dr Anton Best