Public Health struggles to manage COVID cases
(CNS): Government is struggling to report the daily COVID-19 cases and details because Public Health is swamped by the amount of people needing to be tested, as the SARS-CoV-2 virus spreads rapidly through the community. In today’s results, which were not released until 8:20pm, 1,350 PCR tests have been conducted since the last report on Tuesday and of these 126 were positive. Three were in travellers and the rest were community transmissions, but how many of them were vaccinated has not been released.
Because of the pressure on Public Health there has been a change to the system so that positive PCR test results as well as negative results will now be sent via email.
Figures released Wednesday evening revealed that there are currently 521 active cases and four people in hospital. The number of people who are symptomatic was not available, nor was there a breakdown by island. However, there were indications on social media that there are more than a dozen cases on Cayman Brac and several more schools recorded cases on Grand Cayman.
Despite reassurances by government that staffing levels have been increased and government was prepared and able to tackle an increase in the spread of the virus, Chief Medical Officer Dr John Lee said in a video message that Public Health is struggling with the growing number of cases. He said it was becoming too difficult to call everyone with positive results and explain the protocols relating to isolation. Instead, they will now be emailed with the results and the information that people need.
There is still no published lateral flow test policy, so households with one positive case with any unvaccinated individuals, including children, will have to isolate for two weeks, while families with at least one positive case where everyone is vaccinated will need to lockdown for ten days. Dozens more people were locked down today as a result of a positive test and the entire port authority was forced to close because a number of employees tested positive and the rest of the staff had to get tested.
The number of people in isolation has not been released, though it is now expected to be in the region of 2,000, given that in addition to travellers, multiple family members are required to isolate even where just one family member tests positive.
Dr Lee said the number of positives is rising sharply now, which is a concern but most people who are vaccinated will “sail through” with only minor symptoms that can be managed with just paracetamol. But he urged everyone to be prepared and to stock up with food, water and other essentials, given the possibility of being asked to quarantine because of a positive test in their household.
Despite plans to open the borders to tourists in just over three weeks, the sudden and rapid surge in cases here has seen Cayman jump from Level 1 to Level 3 on the United States Center for Disease Control and Prevention COVID-19 travel alert warning.
The vaccination clinic reopened Tuesday and an additional 124 people got their first shot while 106 got their second dose of a COVID-19 vaccine.
To date, there have been 113,448 COVID-19 vaccinations given in total in the Cayman Islands. Of these, 56,365 (79% of an estimated population of 71,106) have had at least one dose of a COVID-19 vaccine and 54,136 (76%) have completed the two-dose course. Additionally 2,947 (representing 15% of those over the age of 50) have had a third or booster dose.
Age group breakdown for first doses, of which 49% are female:
See Dr Lee’s latest video message below:
See the vaccine schedule on the HSA website here.
For more information on vaccines contact the HSA Communications team at
communications@hsa.kySee here for more information on securely verifiable vaccination records.
Anyone with flu symptoms is urged to stay at home in the first instance and contact the 24 hour Flu Hotline or your general practitioner to speak to a health professional about those symptoms before visiting the flu or testing clinic.
Flu Hotline: 1-800-534-8600 or 345-947-3077 or 345-925- 6327 or email flu@hsa.ky
Callers will be screened for travel history and advised on what to do next.
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Category: Health, Medical Health
Is our only RADAR infected as well?
Been out from the 21st.
Don’t worry. They brought in the racoon to fix it.
don’t worry civil service is on it…
Surprise! Not.
In Lansing, Mich., for instance, Sparrow Hospital is seeing a massive swarm of very ill patients having to be lined up on stretchers in the facility’s hallways due to a shortage of available beds.
“It’s hard to watch,” said Tiffani Dusang, the emergency room’s nursing director.
“I always feel very, very bad when I walk down the hallway and see that people are in pain or needing to sleep or needing quiet. But they have to be in the hallway with, as you can see, 10 or 15 people walking by every minute.”
At the start of the Wuhan coronavirus (Covid-19) “pandemic,” long before the so-called “vaccines” were made available through “Operation Warp Speed,” Sparrow Hospital was fairly normal. Once the jabs became widespread, however, the sickly really started to pour in.
Most U.S. hospitals, it turns out, were as empty as could be prior to the release of the jabs. It was only after the injections had been widely distributed that hospitals across the country began to get flooded with new patients.
Tinfoil alert. Scary thing is this person could be sitting next to you on the bus tomorrow.
what is michigans vax rate?
Michiganians got their jabs in Florida in January. My snowbird neighbors did.
This is an extremely ignorant post, trying to tie vaccines to an increase in people in hospital. All the stats show that the increasing numbers in US hospitals are virtually all unvaccinated. Truly misinformation, unhelpful and dangerous.
What a pointless analogy for CAyman. We have an 80 per ecnt vaccination rate so you can’t compare to hospitals struggling in countries pre vaccines at the start of COVID in march 2020. If you are unvaccinated and end up in hospital, it is your fault and no one elses.
..and if you are vaccinated and end up in hospital , or dead, whose fault is that? What if you are vaccinated, but carrying virus and not aware, and you end up infecting others, who is at fault?
Illogical. If you are unvaccinated and pass the virus on so what.
Everyone will have a dose of covid no matter what
Just one question: Is the earth flat?
No but @8:44am is an idiot and an assho!e.
Yes, I realise that, but I was kind of hoping he would answer the question so we could all see his warped, anti-science world view. My guess is that his answer is either “yes” or “probably.”
This just makes me really sad. The quotation you’ve included is from an article about how busy the hospital is because not only are they treating covid patients but also people who delayed getting medical care because they were afraid of covid early in the pandemic. It does not suggest anything about the vaccine like you are implying. Maybe try reading it again.
https://amp.freep.com/amp/8434540002
Or maybe this one about an 81 year old nurse who came out of retirement to help get people vaccinated at that same hospital because she knows it will save lives in their community.
https://www.10news.com/news/national/coronavirus/81-year-old-nurse-comes-out-of-retirement-to-give-covid-19-vaccinations?_amp=true
For the sake of your family, please go get vaccinated.
Can you email results to people over regular email? That seems like a privacy violation unless they’re planning to send encrypted emails.
Yeah, they should just post actual result to your secure myHSA account, and send a note by email saying that a test result is waiting there.
But that would be too sensible.
Don’t worry yourself 8:34, – they have a plan
The plan is emerging. Last week we learned that government was spending money paving private drive ways but refusing to do anything about the AC systems that circulate Covid aerosols in schools and other public buildings.
The NRA are corruptly aligned with PPM and always have been. eg. You’ll note that the West Bay Road paving job ends precisely at the boundary line for MP Joey Hew’s GT North district. Can’t make this stuff up.
Ummm – you seem to have a short memory. Remember the UDP and driveway paving – well they are now calling themselves PACT.
nra …need to be kept busy.
civil service = caymanian social welfare programme
In a workplace that all workers are vaccinated, and all wear masks at work, yet one person tests positive through a contact trace from a child at school, should any of their co-workers be required to isolate and the business or office close?
You realize that the vaccine doesn’t stop you from getting it right? Positives can still give it you, whether they are vaccinated or not.
CNS: But if you are vaccinated, you are highly protected from getting seriously ill or dying.
If you’re unvaccinated and under 50 you’re highly protected by your immune system and have less than 1% of death.
time to move on.
Not true. Vaccinated people are less likely to get covid.
AND ignorant individuals who flaunt the protocols to reduce transmission. I see scores of them every day.
And at this time Covid cases are going down in the US, but Cayman stayed safe for over a year, but now our cases are going up at warp speed due to “a few people” who couldn’t stay home. Funny thouh I don’t see them arrested and put in jail, like Skylar and her boyfriend, is it that she was a foreigner? Cayman is having problems keeping covid at bay now, wait till the 20th Nov, no quarantine…wait till you have more cases. If public Health can’t keep up with the posting how the hell are they gonna keeep up with the actual cases……we are going backwards, instead of forwaards in typical cayman form.
The governor was quoted as saying “However, as I mentioned in my statement last week, in Turks and Caicos, which has stayed open to tourists, the majority of Covid cases are not from tourists, but from the local population travelling overseas and then circulating in the community,” he said.
The government claims to be following the science, but tourists with a negative PCR test (which only means you are negative on the day it was administered) do not have to quarantine and could very well aid in the spread (evident by the number of present travellers that test positive at the end of quarantine. I on the other hand with unvaccinated kids have to quarantine for 15 days if one of my kids has it. Where exactly is the ‘science’ here. Appears only to be applied to those not spending tourist dollars.
The government is our biggest risk here. If there is an outbreak in a hotel, you can bet no one will have to quaratine.
I’ve been saying forever….no unvaccinated travellers should be allowed on any flights to Cayman, regardless of nationality or residency. If you want to go abroad to visit family or shop, you must be vaccinated. In many countries / regions you must be vaccinated to go to a restaurant, let alone sit for a couple hours in a crowded airplane.
Additionally, is anybody curious how so many people are testing positive 15 days after going in to quarantine….seems like maybe these people are getting the virus whilst in “quarantine”
The Sars-CoV-2 incubation period is 14 days so it is to be expected that 1 – 2% of travelers who came in with a negative PCR test, even one that they did not buy for $5 online, will become infectious during quarantine. That is why it was insane to reduce quarantine to 5 days and worse to drop it all together.
You are a complete idiot.
1. You cannot stop Caymanians or PR from coming to the country in which they are from/reside.
2. The incubation period for this virus is STILL 14 DAYS! The Science never changed… so if they test positive on their 15th day (last day)…well guess what it is in line with the science.
You can, and you should. Ask Australians who missed the deadline to return home and then couldn’t. Canada: starting shortly you cannot board an Airplane without proof of vaccination. With the stroke of a pen a government can implement pretty much anything. including: curfews, martial law, conscription, prohibition. In times of crisis the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few
you missed the point. of course we know the 14 days, the point is; how many of these people either caught the virus on the crowded airplane or through games of ‘dominoes’ while in quarantine.
PACTs desire to protect the freedoms of the unvaccinated by not implementing a vaccine passport is either going to result in lockdowns for us all or unnecessary deaths. Both Bermuda and T&C are using vaccine passports for non-essential places. Bermuda waited longer until they had a huge number of cases before it started using them and has had significantly more deaths than T&C.
We seem to be relying on our high vaccination rate as the only way to limit covid cases but that didn’t work for Israel and they also ended up using vaccine passports.
CNS has posted this article a number of times but one sentence really stands out.
“To spread the coronavirus, you have to have the coronavirus. And vaccinated people are far less likely to have the coronavirus—period.”
https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2021/09/the-vaccinated-arent-just-as-likely-to-spread-covid/620161/
In a place as small as Cayman, vaccine passports would only hurt businesses and if you think they would actually be abiding by that, you have another thing coming. No one is going to turn away money. Not after we came out of a pandemic in which businesses lost so much revenue
PACT’s refusal to implement vaccine passports or any other proven means of reducing viral spread has nothing to do with ‘protecting the unvaccinated’ and everything to do with protecting the profits of the cabal.
I actually think some businesses might do better as I’ve spoken to a few people that don’t want to go to restaurants, the gym etc right now. Plus I’m sure most of the people with money to spend are vaccinated anyway.
I wonder if PACT is worried about losing the support of its voters if it brings in a vaccine passport. Maybe a large portion of their voters are unvaccinated.
That makes no sense as gyms are basically only for the vaccinated. So if people are not going, it must be because they do not like the current “rule”. You will see how fast places suffer if CIG is stupid enough to implement a vaccine passport. Furthermore, people are not going to restaurants as frequently because many are not abiding by the mitigation measures, wearing masks and social distancing. So they prefer to order out for delivery.
I go to the gym several times a week and have not been asked to prove my vaccination status once. There is a sign requiring it but even if someone is there, they do not check.
The only places that will suffer will be the bars and clubs.
I actually don’t see how it would really have such a negative economic impact. With 90% of the adult population vaccinated, it doesn’t seem like they’d be losing a lot of business. Plus And any losses would be made up from tourists.
Such utter Nonsense.
If the vaccine doesnt stop the spread of it, you think some little card or digital logo on your phone is going to stop it?? #makeitmakesense
People will be notified by email? HA!
You might as well hire a courier to drive door to door. It would be faster…
What about those of us who are wise to the Government’s surveillance plan and don’t use email?
I was leaning more towards getting all those shots but the Government’s blatant propaganda in refusing to release the numbers of vax v non-vax positives has made up my mind. Thanks CIG.
so i guess you haven’t seen the evidence from other larger countries showing those who get the jab have in general, have reduced symptoms and less likely to die.
Clearly it doesnt work here given our numbers and the amount of people who feel like SHIT
That information is readily available on HCMI.
Yet there will be no quarantine for vaccinated visitors even though the science which the government says it follows says there is a 14 day incubation period. A negative PCR test only shows you are negative on the day it is done. You could be tested positive the day after and have covid, but no quarantine is required, tourists are free to come and spread it further as long as we take their money, but if one of my unvaccinated kids get it we have to quarantine for 15 days. Follow the science but only when convenient.
Not only that but you can buy a personalized negative PCR test for $5. I don’t think that most people do that but it only takes a few to create the kind of mess we now have. We would be better of doing lateral flow testing on all arrivals. It would only add a few minutes to the arrival process and it would keep us safer.
Remember australia
May she Rest In Peace.
So Gov’ts plan is to not have people not quarantine when they arrive, not the brightest bulbs in the socket now are they. Science has proven that even with a negative test, there is a 2 week incubation period for Covid. With that in mind, Surrrrre let them in, no quarantine, no vaccinations, The Country can deal with it.. As we see, even Gov’t employees are carriers, as happened on the Brac and Little. Get vaccinated, and stay away from strangers, good advice from my dear departed mother…
126 Covid cases yesterday, and that does not include the many who were told not to show up for testing as the system was collapsing. PACT – is it beginning to dawn on at least 1 of you that we cannot even see ‘ready’ on the horizon?????
The fact that nobody was punished for breaking quarantine meant that spreading COVID went unchallenged. PACT’s UDP friends are too important to have to obey the law it seems.
Our minister of tourism is too hellbent on being re-elected to care for the consequences of opening up the borders.
Our well intentioned minister of health keeps reassuring us that we got this under control.
Why can’t politicians tell the truth ?
wasn’t 18 months enough time to prepare?
20 months.
First you have to explain and explain and explain to our politicians what ‘prepared’ means. Then you have to explain and explain and explain what ‘ready’ means. Our politicians are still having trouble with ‘prepared’ but assure you that once they figure it out they will move on to ‘ready’.
In the mean time please know that they are happy to reassure you that they are ready.
Yes they are struggling to take tests, in the UK you go to a testing centre, you have very minimal contact with the NHS staff, they put you in a booth with instructions on how to apply the test by yourself, if you have any questions some pen will assist, but that’s it, they don’t preform the test on you. Unlike here in Cayman you have a grpy lady who shoves the stick right into your Brain with a massive smile under the mask for inflicting pain on you.
Maybe just maybe if they would open a sports hall and do what the UK and other EY countries are doi g regarding testing they won’t be so overwhelmed.
Or they could just hire all those persons unemployed a job to assist.
Regarding getting the results. Well you just have to wait, in other countries you can wait up to 72hrz for your results.
Lastly, we have covid in the community, maybe we should all catch it get it over with by the time our boarders are open.
BOARDERS?
Got to love that element. Can’t spell and don’t understand Covid at all.
This is what happens when you follow the UK’s disastrous no quarantine Covid rubbish which fail at the beginning of this crisis and has once again failed at great economic and personal cost but no one wants to except the responsibility for it not in the UK or here in Cayman.Free vaccines and free Virus Cayman. What mess we are in ?
The rising cases isn’t a big deal. Look at the number of symptomatic people – the percentage that represents is tiny.
Just get vaccinated, wear your mask indoors and practice good hygiene and you’ll be fine
You clearly know nothing about the time line from infection to death. Every country that has had a bad surge thought everything was fine for a while, then 2 weeks later people end up in hospital and 2 – 6 weeks after that they start dying. Merry Christmas from PACT.
And CITA. Don’t forget them!!
I agree. Don’t blame PACT they were just following orders.
Orders from their UDP leader.
All I have been hearing in press conference after press conference is how the government is ready for the reopening of the borders. This is clearly not the case and it is now time for some accountability and some honesty.
They are ready to reopen the border, they aren’t ready to manage public health in the community.
At this point tourists are the least of our worries.
We are testing a massive % of the population every day, but the test positivity is sky-high and congratulations for the past two days Cayman has had the highest per capita Covid case rate in the World!
520 active cases likely means another 1500 to 2000 currently infected who haven’t been tested. Could be one out of every thirty people in Cayman currently infected.
We are in our first actual wave. This is going to keep spreading and spreading now that it is becoming widespread.
In Bermuda and many other countries when they started having explosive spread individuals took their own mitigating actions such as temporarily working from home, voluntarily having kids do remote learning for a few weeks.
As in all places, once cases start to explode, hospital hospitalizations start occurring in volume about 2 to 3 weeks later. I predict we won’t be as bad as many other places given their level of vaccinations and a relatively younger population. Going against us however is that our population has very very little natural immunity because we’ve had minimal infections prior to this month.
Everybody’s been making predictions for the last 6 to 7 months but now we don’t have to wait any longer. Next few weeks will be very interesting.
This thing is here to stay. Stop worrying about travelers because its unvaccinated residents that are driving this wave. In truth, travelers should be afraid of getting it while they visit. Both governments have begged and pleaded for everyone to get the jab. I’m not fan of either side, but let’s not pretend that its their fault that people who refused to listen to modern medicine and common sense got sick from a highly infectious disease.
What utter rubbish?
Release the boosters for everyone and stop wasting time…
In my view neither Public Health nor its staff have failed the people of Cayman in any way. They are extremely understaffed and under-resourced for the current situation. Frankly I am amazed that they have not burned out already.
It is the PACT government that failed to implement measures to limit virus spread and then they compounded that failure by failing to provide Public Health with the human and other resources required to manage Covid. All PACT had to do was look at the Covid management protocols and resources utilised by competent governments. The situation we are now in is the direct result of a complete political failure.
I do not recall any public Health official suggesting that they were anything but ready for what was coming. Do you? Civil servants have been known to lie to politicians or otherwise mislead. Do you concede there may be an issue there?
The politicians have that covered by legislation. The Public Service Management Act prohibits civil servants from speaking out when to do so might show politicians to be idiots.
Section 5(2)e)
“a public servant must not, at any time, engage in any activity that brings his ministry, portfolio, statutory authority, government company, the public service or the government into disrepute;”
..and if you are vaccinated and end up in hospital , or dead, whose fault is that? What if you are vaccinated, but carrying virus and not aware, and you end up infecting others, who is at fault?
PACT are doing what the public was shouting for them to do just a week ago – join the rest of the world and live with the virus. They wrote letters. They called their MLAs and barked at them. They posted how “ridiculous” it was to be “closed” on Facebook. Well, these are the opening scenes in what that wish looks like. We will peak at around 800 cases per day, perhaps as soon as mid-Dec, then it tapers, with whoever is left, into Q1 2022. Public Health are really going to be tested. If you want to blame a group, point the finger at “Reopen Cayman” and the Karen moms that have always been poorly calibrated.
Exactly.
Key message – 521 positive, only 4 in hospital. The Island paused whilst we all got vaccinated, let it role now. We need that herd immunity, and slowing it down with such a low hospital rate is not going to help. The Cayman Islands is in one of the best places for this, having eliminated it until we were ready to face it. Bring it on now, we have to take the hit to resume the normal world.
Learn to spell.
One person in hosital is not there because of Covid. They have another medical issue and just happened to be tested for Covid. Need to stop counting that one as still being hospitalised for Covid
2
Release the boosters to all who are eligible, forget about the stupid age restriction.
Are you naturally so delusional or do you take a drug that helps you get that way?
A real fine mess PACT has gotten us into. We have gone from a little perfect bubble with an economy booming to a situation where everything is coming to a grinding halt.
When these people cannot go to work we will see the economy slow and everyone will suffer. All because of the stupidity of people who put the self serving interests of a handful of of people over the common good of the Country.
Public Health is now overwhelmed with the influx of tests over the last few days. Can you imagine how it will be when the flood gates are opened? And its going to get steadily worse as the numbers continue to increase daily.
And here is our beloved Premier and his inexperienced and misguided cohorts being just like Nero who fiddled while Rome burned.
I guess they are still trying to help our assist our beloved Deputy Governor to cross the i’s and dot the t’s!
When will this stupidity end? Please God, help us!
I don’t think God is going to help you… technically he put you in this mess. Why would someone who “loves” you so much make you suffer… Furthermore, “when these people cannot go to work”- you must mean the people who denied getting vaccinated and are now suffering the consequences which were inevitable and known in the first place. I think the term stupid should be pointed towards the unvaccinated people and not the government. Every vaccinated person wants to open the borders due to confidence in their immunity from the vaccine. Just a heads up, the united states along with other countries in the world will not allow unvaccinated people into their country.
Booming economy? Are you for real? Booming price rises, Govt running out of money due to stipends, people being priced out the housing market, folks with no jobs. Yeah! Booming economy 🤦♂️
CNS, you probably need to ask why public health are struggling with the tests and what has been going on the the HSA lab. The people that got us through last year have been pushed out, and not testing. Island politics over practical application.
And the island politics, of the nature well underway, are not even from this island!
Take two Paracetamol (Tylenol) and don’t call back until you need an ambulance and can’t breath.
WTF is wrong with these people? Where are the monoclonal treatments and the other extremely safe alternatives?
Seems Tylenol may actually be harmful as a covid treatment in the elderly as well.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8426871/
Follow the silence and read the books they want to burn.
Where do we see the press release where this information is put out? There is nothing on exploregov.ky nor the gov.ky/news.
https://www.gov.ky/news/press-release-details/covid-19-update-27-october-2021
Thank you. I see that it is up today. I looked yesterday when reports started circulating within the community and at that time the information was not public.
Looks like people on island are forgetting to do Covid protocols w/ that much spread!
Mask up- social distance- vaccinate!
YouTube CIG TV
“Chief Medical Officer Dr John Lee said in a video message that Public Health is struggling with the growing number of cases.“ If they are struggling with just doing the increased amount of tests, what did PACT mean by they are ready to meet everything related to COVID in the community when the borders open? They are failing miserably even before we reach there. Not only it would be chaos after 20 November, PACT would just not be able to handle managing. COVID spread in the community.
If they are sensible, they would start putting some restrictive measures NOW before it goes out of hand and is unmanageable. Wake up PACT!
what exactly is behind “struggling with the growing number of cases”? Too many tests to process? Shortage of qualified personnel?
We have human and technical resources for about 1/4 of the test load they have been handed. However, the principal factor is that our politicians have no concept of what getting ‘ready’ means in the context of a potential Covid surge.
You might as well work for PACT as your suggestion has as much detail as their plans.
We all need to accept some personal responsibility for ourselves, and others, reducing in-person anything. Stock up on supplies for 2 weeks. My spouse had a meeting with someone who is now a positive, and we are stuck in our home for 10 days. Welcome to the new normal. This is what we wanted right?
Most countries do not quarantine people that test negative. If you are in contact with a positive case, you just get tested and only quarantine if it comes back positive. Yes, of course, there is still some risk because of the incubation period of the virus. But living with covid is about accepting some risk so people can continue their normal lives.
Believe me, when you talk to medical personnel @ HSA, they are every concerned that the “medical system” is simply not prepared to cope with the pending wave of Covid-19 cases. Public Health is already struggling, so tell you what. . .let’s open the borders. Madness!
This is what profits over people looks like. Government could have slowed this right down by using simple public health measures but they followed the money and not the interests of their constituents.
The rider on the pale horse is here for his vacation. You can find him at any local watering hole today.
Only 4 dead have been reported in Bermuda for the first 3 days of this week so the way things are going here we are still in the running.
Really uncool to wish this stuff.
Only 4 dead? Oh, that’s okay then.
From 0 to 521 active cases in a flash! That is way above the threshold for being put on the CDC list of the most dangerous countries for tourists to visit. Let me guess – that was part of the plan too.
What plan? To never open up?
This is what everybody wanted, right? Hello from quarantine!
Christmas is coming and those that are still alive are needed to spend big money in the shops – and they can’t do that with mandates. Soon, nearly everyone in the Cayman Islands will have had COVID-19 and those that live can get on with their lives completely normally. Some of the olds might die and maybe a couple youngs get disabled for life, but shit happens, birds die. I just hope all the olds have their wills in order. I wouldn’t mind grampa’s Audi myself, or maybe his piece of land in Lower Valley.
I’ll take a stab at a guess that Dr John Lee wishes it was January 2022 about now.
Public health is clearly under resourced and not ready for what is happening let alone what is going to happen when PACT drops quarantine and we get a flood of Covid from infected tourists.
According to the CDC the tourists need to be more frightened of us than us of them.
The CDC only reports on the risk that Cayman now poses and then hopes that sensible US citizens take note.
126 cases are nothing. My state had 1600 today. We don’t blink anymore. We go to work, schools, malls, sporting events, rest, gyms. We wear masks and social distance. The smart ones get vaccinated so we won’t get hospitalized when or if we get Covid and our chance of death is less. We are all making travel plans!
Note it has nothing to do with tourists currently. It’s with residents. Stop blaming others for everything! Tourists will be vaccinated coming down or quarantined if not. Get over yourselves- it is you that are spreading Covid in your own community!!
1 – 2% of fully vaccinated tourists tested positive at the end of the 14 day quarantine. That was dozens every week. Then government cut the quarantine period to 5 days for a virus with an incubation period of 14 days. Now we have what we have.
There is no evidence that it was reducing the quarantine to five days. We had the five day quarantine for months and no cases. And yes they were testing.
Both Australia and New Zealand kept their strict 14 day hotel quarantine and still ended up getting cases. This could be a result of breaches, infecting airport staff, illegal entry etc etc The delta variant finds a way in eventually so we have to learn to adapt to it.
Meanwhile hundreds of People are being paid thousands of dollars to do nothing. For Christ’s sake, why are they not being drafted in to fulfil administrative and supporting roles?
6.51am They are being hired to do just that.
So many delusional people out there it’s frightening. Some of you think we can go through this pandemic without rising numbers of local transmission. Which planet do you live on?
Didn’t take vaccine and worry about possible symptoms too much? Well, we all have been given every opportunity.
Can’t hide under the blanket forever. Time to move on.
Indeed, and we have had 18-months to prepare for what everyone is saying was “obvious”. Now let’s open the borders. . .yeah, right.
Bless your cotton socks, the flood of community transmission is already here. It has more to do with dominos curfew breaches and unvaccinated than any political party.
True that inbound traveller quarantine gets dropped for vaccinated travellers in a few weeks, but that doesn’t spell the end of our domestic contact tracing quarantines.
Those guests will be leaping into our boiling pot, and if they become positive, or become a primary or secondary contact of someone that is (maybe their waiter), then guess what?
I have a coworker that has had to enter their second quarantine this month due to contact tracing. Out and in the clear for a few hours and then right back in again!
Vaxed or not, tested or waiting, you are out of the game for several days, and maybe you had other plans that now need to be canceled. This is what the next few months lookalike for all of us. Merry Christmas!
From CITA and PACT!
Second shot and booster kicked my butt, can’t imagine getting this for real. Stay safe out there!
Sorry to hear. I had absolutely no issues at all with my second shot and booster.
Second shot kicked my butt, but the booster only kicked one cheek.
At least Dr. John is giving good prep advice for the rest of the re-opening plan. Everybody should lay in food, water and essential medication as it seems likely that with the current level of mismanagement everybody will get infected very soon. and don’t forget the toilet paper!
If they are struggling now, heaven help us when there are 50 or more Covid patients requiring hospitalization, and unvaccinated nurses start testing positive. There has been plenty of time to prepare. We have been promised they were ready. Where is the disconnect?
We have politicians with no relevant experience overriding all known public health protocols and still unable to find the word ready in a dictionary.
So will the vaccinated nurses FYI.
But it will be less likely that the vaccinated nurses will test positive FYI.
Stop trying to justify your selfishness.
Well done PACT. 7 weeks ago we had no Covid. We currently have about 1% of the population with known Covid and about 4% of the population in isolation/quarantine in a highly vaccinated country. PACT is definitely doing what no other government has managed to do so quickly.
This is government demonstrating its readiness and capacity prior to opening the country to infected tourists. One of the highest infection rates on the planet at the moment.
CIG PRESS RELEASE!
December 20, 2021
Public Health Officials have indicated that, after approximately two-and-a-half months since community-spread cases of covid first occurred and exactly 1 month since full re-opening, there are currently 2781 positive cases, 132 hospitalizations and 15 deaths. 5 deaths were unvaccinated hospital staff and 3 of those were ICU nurses. As hospitalizations continue, HSA has informed the public that while there are available ventilators, there are very few staff trained to operate them. But an HSA spokesperson said “There is no need for alarm. The HSA is closely following the guidelines implemented by the Government. We are diligently following the Government directives and remain in close liaison and cooperation with the Ministry of Health & Wellness”.
When asked, a Cabinet spokesperson said “The Government of the Cayman Islands has the situation firmly in hand. We accepted that there would be covid casualties, that is the collateral damage we have to expect with re-opening. Of course, the economic benefits to the tourist and restaurant industry of re-opening is not yet evident”.
The spokesperson went on to say that as the US CDC’s travel restriction rating for the Cayman Islands is now “high” and JetBlue remains the only US carrier to resume operations so far, the expected influx of tourist and visitors has not materialized as expected.
Meanwhile, as unquarantined vaccinated visitors continue to arrive, primarily on flights from the UK, Jamaica and Honduras, CBC has reported an increase in discovery of suspicious or blatantly false vaccination documents, especially from the nearby region. The Head of the CBC said that, while his Department’s officers are not specifically trained in detecting false vaccine documents, “they are doing a good job”.
An enlightened Cabinet spokesperson, remarked that “Government now recognizes that re-opening based on the hopes of select sections of our economy may have not been the best approach but it had to be tried. In retrospect, the Government wishes it had thought the residual issues through more intently and put mitigation strategies in place”. The spokesman also speculated “with Christmas upon us, the Government expects a sharp rise in covid infections after the holidays and may consider re-introducing some restrictions thereafter”.
Best post of the week!
Government has had months to put in place measures to control this type of outbreak. They have failed utterly.
So a week on from the “We are absolutely ready” press conference it is clear that government has no idea what ready even means.
Pity most voters didn’t require actual qualifications.
Dr Lee breaking down six weeks after Wayne’s statement and pretty much saying ‘we’re still not ready’. Cabal people what do you think, you’ve been pretty good at this so far 🙄
ps – I’m up for reopening but this looks to be shaping up to become a disaster 🍿
Cabal people say – its all about the Benjamins baby.
Any word on the booster eligibility starting next week? Nothing updated on HSA site. Hopefully open up to plus 40s or 45s.
Eat less crap and exercise
By Monday we should have one thousand with covid. This is not a disaster, Island was without anything for almost two years, the virus loves that. Be patient and all will be good.
If 1% of your thousand require hospitalization in 2 to 3 weeks, that will use up 100 beds.
Then there will be 2,000 cases in the following week (200 more beds). If we do nothing to significantly break transmission, 4,000 in the following week (400 more beds).
Hospitalization tends to be for 3 weeks.
So based on those numbers, in 6 weeks we will need 700 beds.
Oops! We only have 40 ICU beds available.
Does anyone in control actually think ahead? Can someone ask CITA what we should do? After all, we are pursuing their plan, and they know all about this, right? Of course we would not be following their plan if they had not thought it through.
I think the tourism industry just cancelled Christmas.
Great post. Thank you for laying our situation out so well.
Over the last year and half we’ve had almost 1,000 people with Covid. How many required ICU? Now the next 1,000 will require 100 spaces and so on? Astounding logic!
Plus the math is absolutely wrong as 1% of 1,000 is 10 not 100.
I would have expected the over 50 booster rate to be higher. If 99% of over 50s got the first two jabs when there was no spread, got to get your boost while there is rampant spread for the first time. A significant percentage of the Cayman population will be exposed to the virus in the next 6 weeks — equip your bodies as best you can.
(I went last Thursday later in the morning. Zero line up. Go for it!).
I went today. Many people lined up. Only 3 nurses giving vaccine doses. It took quite a while but I am glad that eventually I got through.
Thanks for letting us know Wednesday’s crowd. I suspect booster activity will increase substantially.
It’s toilet paper time
This is simply because WE are not following the guidance given by the health officials. Mask, hand hygiene, and distance. Let’s not blame others for our mistakes.
Most of the problem is down to government not implementing vaccine mandates, mask mandates, capacity restrictions on high risk indoor activities or anything else that competent government all over the planet have already implemented!
None of that stops the spread. Barely slows it down. California and New York have tried that approach and it didn’t stop anything. It goes up, then it comes back down, then it repeats..
There are ways in addition to vaccines that will curb severe illnesses and deaths but the government is apparently not interested in those ideas. They won’t even give it a chance.
It’s not government. It’s the businesses. They are controlling everything now.
Government mandated that all expats be vaccinated. So what you really need to say is, government isn’t implementing mandates for Caymanians. Why not?
This is because PACT dropped the quarantine.
This is because PACT is listening to Dart and indentured tenants (aka the cabal)
This is because IDIOTS voted for PACT.
Totally agree with your first 2 points. I don’t think that the people who voted for the individuals that later decided to barter for power were idiots. They simply trusted.
As the saying goes – fool me once shame on you. Fool me twice shame on me. I won’t be fooled again.
It’s because the people dem needed fresh herb.
Nothing to do with locals who ignored/breached quarantine then? Or people who don’t wear masks and operate good hand hygiene? All the last 18 months has taught us is complacency. We are a year behind the rest of the world in dealing with this thanks to your precious, unsustainable, bubble.
WE meaning most restaurants and retailers and service places. They knew the risk and chose to ignore it
At this point, it is so prevalent that it will take a miracle for us all not to get it in the next two months. We might as well have tourists come since we’ll be the ones giving Covid to them!
The plan is to have everyone infected before the tourists come. We can’t have the tourists bothered by funeral processions can we.
And for more reasons than just COVID – terrible driving, expat hatred, muggings, etc. Of course, if they’re big Squid Game fans, Cayman is a great place for them!
We have to flatten the curve quickly. There is no way our healthcare systems can deal with prolonges spread at anything like these rates. Offices need to be closed. Indoor dining needs to be tightly restricted. Vaccine passports need to be implemented, now! If these things are not done without delay there appears a real risk of a collapse of healthcare with consequential unnecessary deaths and untold suffering. Oh, and by the way, Hurricane Season is not done yet. Just imagine what happens if thousands of us get together in shelters in a couple of weeks time. This is not a time for dithering.
What are you even on about? Very very few people are actually getting sick. That is, and always should have been, the goal. We’re never going to stop cases spreading and as long as no one is getting sick why on early would we literally shut down the island as you suggest?
If you shut down the island now what do you do in 6 months when it’s still out there in the world?! Or in 2 years? Just stay closed?
Get the vaccine and stay healthy and get in with life. Quit this absolute paranoia.
I think we should all be allowed to isolate at the Ritz with free room service. After all, we are enduring this for them, right?
You absolutely can. It’s only $600 a night! They’ll throw in free room service delivery, but you still need to pay for the food and drink.
There is a lag between infection and getting sick. We have lost control. We need to slow infection rates or some (perhaps even many) will die not from Covid but from a failure to provide necessary healthcare to them (and others).
Whole office today unexpectedly closed and everyone primary contact of a positive church-belt coworker. So much fun. This has already made the socio-economic leap and will cut through us all. Get your booster if you’re not already in quarantine – and expect to be there soon, one way or another before the month is out.
Public Health has no business trying to manage all the cases. Their remit is to treat the handful who have more than a lozenge and a box of tissues can help.
Says the public health expert – Not
Idiot – public health does not treat patients – the try to prevent the spread of disease – a task made impossible by incompetent politicians it seems.
Very sad what’s happening to theses Islands now. When we had it so good for a long time
Totally agree but that is what happens when government’s priority switches from people to the wallets of a few.
Switches? Ha! The status quo never changed. Pact are a bunch of a lackies who have sold out to the highest bidder.
I hope the open the border brigade are happy as pigs in $$$$ now.
Actually it is what happens when you create a bubble that by nature, could only ever be temporary. At least this is happening post vaccine. That’s the best we can ask for.
Totally incompetent government who should have ordered a snap 14 day lockdown 10 days ago to curb this explosion of cases- just as New Zealand and Australia did when they had a handful of new infections.
Govt – with Lee now backpedaling- have wasted all the past efforts. Shameful.
That would make sense if it were possible to eliminate the virus worldwide. Thats never going to happen. Its time to learn to live with the virus like the rest of the world.