Four travellers COVID positive over last two days
(CNS): The number of active cases of COVID-19 among travellers has increased to eight, with one of them showing symptoms, after four people tested positive over the last two days. This comes as cases are spiking around the world, driven by the Delta variant, which Premier Wayne Panton described as a “most formidable and lethal foe” posing a serious risk to those who are unvaccinated. Vaccination numbers increased slightly Wednesday after the clinic reopened. An additional 87 people have been vaccinated for the first time and 167 for the second.
With concern mounting globally over the Delta and other variants, and in light of the problems in countries that have opened back up too early, the premier is now promising a new vaccine drive, as Cayman is sticking to the target of an 80% vaccination rate by the 9 September. However, this requires a significant increase in the number of people getting vaccinated.
Meanwhile, the UK has revised its entry requirements for people arriving in England via countries currently on its ‘amber’ travel list and also vaccinated under the UK’s vaccination programme delivered in British Overseas Territories. This means that Cayman Islands residents vaccinated here and travelling to England through common transit countries, including the Bahamas, the United States, Canada, Jamaica, or any other amber list country, will no longer need to quarantine. This policy has not yet been extended to Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales.
Those travelling directly to England are already exempt from isolation if they are fully vaccinated, though they still have to have a PCR swab and test two days after arrival.
The UK is not currently accepting the vaccination cards given to Cayman Islands residents as verified proof of vaccination. However, the Governor’s Office has worked in conjunction with the Health Services Authority (HSA) and the Public Health Department to develop a standard certificate in line with all other British Overseas Territories which can be used for entry through the UK border.
Chief Medical Officer Dr John Lee noted, “While a ‘Letter of Certification’ has been developed for entry through the UK border, we would like to remind Cayman Islands residents vaccinated locally that this is for border entry purposes only. At this time, it is not possible to have a Cayman vaccination entered into the UK’s securely verifiable electronic NHS system.”
Dr Lee has previously stated that efforts are ongoing to develop a securely verifiable electronic system for COVID-19 vaccines administered in the Cayman Islands.
“The Health Services Authority has contracted with Cerner, the HSA’s hospital information system, to provide securely verifiable evidence of a Cayman Covid-19 vaccination programme in the form of a secure QR code, although this will take computer engineers a few months to implement,” he said.
Letters of Certification will be available from the office of the Medical Officer of Health. Members of the public are asked to apply by email to nola.sanderson@hsa.ky attaching a copy of their vaccination card via screen shot or attachment to the email request.
All requests will take three business days to process, so applicants are asked to take this time into account when submitting their requests prior to travel.
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Category: Health, Local News, Medical Health, Travel
The anti-vaxxers are here to stay, so let’s all work together. Now that we have the Delta variant on island, let’s put those infected with Delta in communal housing with anti-vaxxers as a way to get a better herd immunity. The anti-vaxxers, as they have been telling us, won’t die and won’t be very sick at all if they are infected. If they’re wrong, then we still win, because it’s just a matter of thinning out the herd.
9:04, The problem is that we will never get out of this COVID situation because as long as you have one third of society refusing to get vaccinated then the virus will continue to mutate. We will never have numbers high enough to get herd immunity.
Life is never going to be the same.
Only good thing in all of this is that the idiot gene in humans will be severely impacted. Darwin was correct.
We dont want to accept USA certificates. But we cry when ours r not accepted. There was ample time almost a year before we got vaccine to develop vaccine certificate with QR code like others. Public Health Department should have worked with England to sort out
Getting rid of the arrival PCR test was a HUGE mistake. Example: I went up to the States to retrieve my daughter from uni. I left on a Thursday, we returned on a Sunday. I tried to find a free PCR location, aka a Walgreens or CVS. None could provide results within the 72 hour framework required . So, I went to a private lab. They barely swabbed my nose, and charged me 139 USD. No surprise my result was negative. They barely like touched my nostrils with the q-tip. I am fully vaccinated, so low risk. But really we are worried about fake CDC vax cards, rather than shoddy PCR labs? And the test was only hours after leaving Cayman. I took it even could have had exposure as our trip was only 78 hours.
For people who are traveling, Miami International Airport has two walk-up testing sites for passengers, employees and visitors. One is open 24 hours. Both accept walk-ins and appointments. Test costs range from $79 to $179.
All state-run testing and vaccine sites are closed, including the popular site at Hard Rock Stadium in Miami Gardens. County-run sites are still open. Select pharmacies, hospitals, clinics, urgent care centers and doctors’ offices are also offering testing or vaccinations.
Read more here: https://www.miamiherald.com/news/coronavirus/article252903848.html#storylink=cpy
Yeah, the brilliant Trumpite Florida Governor closed down all the state run testing and vaccine sites.
He thought the COVID problems were all solved in Florida while during the past week, 23% of all new COVID cases in America were in Florida.
Florida is screwed again, and we in the Cayman Islands are now part of the collateral damage.
Stupidity and ignorance is killing Florida and hurting us too.
BBC today:
“Covid cases at record levels for 20 to 29-year-olds….
Meanwhile people aged 85 and above continue to be most likely to need hospital care…
…hospital admissions and deaths were not growing as quickly as in previous waves…”
My daughter works in the US hospital. Her observations (before vaccinations): most 80+ recover from Covid fairly quickly, it is 40-60 age category who were dying, sometime in less than 72 hours from a cytokine storm.
Lastly, one of her supervisors spent a month in ICU having anaphylaxis that couldn’t be stopped, the cause of which has not been disclosed.
Unfortunately kids are ending up hospitalized now too because their parents won’t get vaccinated in the us.
From the twitter account of Eric Topol @EricTopol, July 21, 2021
Just published New England Journal of Medicine:
Vaccine protection against the Delta variant from >4,000 cases + comparison w/ Alpha, by @PHE_uk
—mRNA, 2-dose: 88% effectiveness vs *any* symptomatic infection
—AZ, 2-dose: 67%
https://twitter.com/EricTopol/status/1417955897087725569
This is interesting:
XXXX
Worth considering.
CNS: No, it’s not. Vaccine doubters’ strange fixation with Israel
Good info. Just shows why it’s so important to get the vaccine.
What’s scary is a very large number of people still believe you can’t get or infect others with Covid after you’ve been vaccinated.
Scarier still is the number of unvaccinated people who believe the same but they have Allah, God, Yahweh, Big Bird or the Pink Panther to keep them safe.
Let’s open the borders and prove them all wrong and move on with our lives. Take care of your loved ones who have underlying conditions because nobody else will die.
Nothing is scary. Life continues.
If there was a vaccination for people like you to disappear out of my site I would be the first in line to take it.
That 99.8 % can’t be scientifically proven.
It is in fact simply wrong by virtue of the unknown Asymptomatic number that all governments will never know.
That number may in fact be double, treble or 1000 times more than proven positive cases throughout the planet if as if they say Covid is so infectious.
Move the decimal point. Every indication is that cases with an outcome have a 2% mortality rate.
With the vaccine, yes.
Last 14 months over 700,000 died with COVID in America.
Not sure where you got the 99.8% number from?
You are right – 99.8% survival is based on the US population being double what it actually is with every single person getting Covid at least once.
So far 626,000 people have died of Covid in the US, or 1,880 per million.
Applying that to Cayman’s population would equate to 134 Covid deaths to date in Cayman.
Is every positive test checked for variants including Delta?.
“The UK is not currently accepting the vaccination cards given to Cayman Islands residents as verified proof of vaccination.”
🤣😂🤣😂🤣😂🤣😂
Turnabout is fair play! Cayman thinks their system is superior to all others and won’t accept US cards and even some UK ones.
They actually are with a verified letter from HSA
Why is this not made known to the public
As of today Florida is # 1 for new COVID cases and people hospitalized.
We are not opening here for some time with number coming out of Florida.
As of June 4, Florida no longer provides daily updates. New data is announced once a week.
What cases?
Symptomatic? Asymptotic? Hospitalizations? In ICU? Deceased?
Governor DeSantis declared last month that info on new COVID cases and COVID deaths in Florida will no longer be released to the public.
The stats will make him look bad during his campaign for 2024.He said the problem was solved.
Florida is the ONLY American state that does not release COVID stats anymore.
No wonder doctors in Florida are now at war with their Governor.
Likely all unvaccinated
EL PASO, Texas (KFOX) —Officials with the City of El Paso, Texas confirm that seven fully vaccinated people have died of COVID-19.
CNS: It’s important to put it into perspective. The vaccines have a very high rate of effectiveness but it’s not 100%.
Texas has seen nearly 9,000 COVID-19 deaths since February. All but 43 were unvaccinated people.
And from El Paso – Angela Mora, the city’s spokeswoman explained all of them had underlying health conditions. The first death was reported on July 8th, just under two weeks ago. The city did not say how old the victims were or which vaccine they received. “Any vaccine we get, we’re going to be seeing a breakthrough case,” said Dr. Ocaranza.
From today’s Guardian
UK nationals who had their vaccinations overseas and find themselves unable to register for domestic Covid passes, or obtain other double-jabbed benefits like avoiding quarantine when returning from amber-list countries, should see this change soon, Nadhim Zahawi has said.
Asked about the issue in the Commons by Labour’s Rupa Huq, Zahawi, the vaccine deployment minister for England, said:
In terms of UK nationals who have been vaccinated overseas, by the end of this month they’ll be able to talk to their GP, go through what vaccine they’ve had, and have it registered with the NHS as being vaccinated.
The contact with a GP was necessary to ensure their vaccine was one of those approved for use in the UK, Zahawi added.
He also said moves were afoot for reciprocal recognition of 33 other countries’ vaccination proof schemes, so non-UK nationals jabbed overseas could also have the benefits. This “will happen very soon”, he added.
Why are they not disclosing whether the positive Covid cases are from vaccinated travelers????
Because they don’t want you to know. They want you to be shocked each time they report a covid case and to want to keep the border closed. If you realized that the cases were people who were not vaccinated it would make sense that the borders could be opened now to those who are vaccinated. Life could move on.
Guardian reports today that scientific advisors in the UK are advocating that boosters be given this fall – good thing we have a huge supply that the non-vaccinated don’t seem to be interested in.
Scientists have backed proposals for Covid boosters in the autumn after blood tests on hundreds of people revealed that protective antibodies can wane substantially within weeks of second vaccine shots being given.
Falls in antibodies after vaccination are expected and do not necessarily mean people are more vulnerable to disease, but the researchers are concerned that if the declines persist the effectiveness of the vaccines may diminish.
The UCL Virus Watch study found that antibodies generated by two doses of the Oxford/AstraZeneca and Pfizer/BioNTech vaccines started to wane as early as six weeks after the second shot, in some cases falling more than 50% over 10 weeks.
The researchers stress that both vaccines are extremely effective against Covid, but say the findings support plans for a booster campaign this autumn, particularly for those who were vaccinated early and with the Oxford/AstraZeneca shot.
“We know levels of antibodies start high and drop substantially,” said Prof Rob Aldridge, an infectious disease epidemiologist at University College London. “We’re concerned that if they carry on dropping at the rate we’ve seen, the protective effects of the vaccines will start to drop too, and the big question is, when is that going to happen?”
No they are not! They are advocating boosters this autumn. There is no “fall” where the Queen is on the currency.
Ill-informed Pedantry – like a breeze wafting from the sewage treatment facility.
Her majesty is on the currency in Canada where what you refer to as ‘autumn’ is referred to as ‘the fall’
The better educated ones say Autumn. And resorting to Canada is always a bit of barrel scraping.
Why? The Queen is the Head Of State in Canada.
Who cares
Humans will never win fights against viruses. Compared to Ebola or Malaria for example, COVID19 is relatively harmless, therefore response must be focused on effective treatments of severe cases and personal protective measures which must include solar ultraviolet light exposure that is plentiful. Sitting inside all day long provides zero solar exposure.
Otherwise the “victory” would be Pyrrhic, because economy will be destroyed, people succumbed to cancer and other diseases treatment of which is put on hold, suicides and mental disorders.
You have no clue – Humans have beaten viruses for millennia as evidenced by the fact that we are still here – small pox (a virus) has been eliminated from the face of the earth through vaccination – Malaria is not caused by a virus – prevention is better than cure – there is no evidence that sitting in the sun all day or injecting yourself with bleach will do anything other than cause harm – Facebook is not a scientific journal –
Not sure why I bother –
Get in the real world out of your artificial bubble then write back in a few months. I want to hear how is it working for you. I”ll be happy for you if it does.
I also agree with 8:00, have no social media accounts or TV service. So don’t assume things about people.
We cant open.
Fear will take over as there is no plan as to what will happen once there is community spread, and there will be.
Until we know what the “plan” is when a grade two student tests positive, or a staff member at a supermarket, we cant trust the government to make to make the decisions on the fly… Because they will shut us down.
So, lets keep trying to get to the impossible goal of 80% and in the meantime (i can think of one place this money could have come from) increase the capacity at Travel Time.
Lets get more flights happening so we can get these 800 folks off the travel waiting list and where they need to go (and back again).
Lets just keep managing the quarantine system for people who wish to come and go as they please as it is for the foreseeable future.
My school in the US was in session all thru the pandemic. When there was a covid case the health officials would figure out was there close contact and what was the time period. The person with covid was always put in immediate quarantine and then depending on the close contact information either no one was out or certain people were out or a full classroom was put in quarantine. These quarantine situations were the people’s homes. School just continued with very little disruption. The people who were in quarantine went to online study.
It really was not an issue. No buildings shut down.
Life continued.
Same here! My child had numerous times that there was a positive in one of their classes but only those in close contact (within six feet with no mask for more than 15 minutes) had to isolate. No clusters of cases! School of 3000 kids…..few (if any) needed any treatment at all, not one ended up in hospital, and never once had to shut down. One teacher was hospitalized for a few days but he had underlying conditions (obesity and diabetes) and was unvaccinated.
Our school district has almost as many kids as the entire population of Cayman plus a few thousand teachers and staff. Not one death or serious illness despite many testing positive in the fall (before vaccines were available). Since vaccines became readily available earlier this year, positive cases dropped dramatically!!!!!
GET VACCINATED and trust it! With Pfizer, you are unlikely to catch Covid once vaccinated (unless on immunosuppressants for other conditions) and IF you do catch it, you will not be seriously ill.
Lifestyle gave them underlying condition? Hmm…
Some metabolic disorders could be connected to a lifestyle, however how do you explain
an epidemic of neurological, autoimmune and autonomic dysfunction?
I remember the year when 50% or more students and teachers were sick with flu. School never closed, I didn’t get sick with flu that year. .
I also remember when there were not one case of measles in a city of 1M residents. My 11mo breastfed child got it. I lived in a country where doctors visit sick people at home, so cases of extremely contagious measles couldn’t go unnoticed. Children vaccinated against measles at 12 months.
Big whoop. 4 cases. Bigger question- Were these travelers vaccinated?
Only let in vaccinated travelers.
What is the difference between vaccinated travelers coming in or vaccinated locals and residents? What is the difference between now , September or January?
Since 2020 I crossed the globe twice, different countries, airports etc. While wearing a face mask on a plane is a must, I never wore it anywhere else. Tested negative each time.
Come rescue me!
It would be helpful if the government indicated what percentage of people testing positive are locally vaccinated.
If our testing equipment is working we must be detecting the Delta variant here as well as it is now the dominant variant in the UK and the US. All we here from government is crickets.
Dr. Lee, what is happening with the verification of USA issued CDC vaccination cards? And are you even including residents who got their vaccinations in USA in Cayman’s figures when they contact HSA to report it? No one will answer this.
It has been a month since anything has been said about this. Even those who can provide the Q source scannable code (which CIG said is what is required) are being told this does not qualify because HSA will not individually verify them. The USA is never going to have a unified system to verify individual states cards. SO what is HSA going to do? THis is an important part of any reopening plan, isn’t it?