Two in three Jamaicans COULD get COVID - Health ministry says virus will be widespread by next year

'What goes around, comes around.' - That's how Dr Webster-Kerr, national epidemiologist, puts it as she sought to humble Jamaicans who fuel the stigma around persons suffering from COVID-19.

She said that there is a high possibility that majority of the Jamaica population could catch the virus.

"Almost two thirds of us will get COVID-19. Some of us may not even know, but we would have had it. So, to discriminate against somebody at this time is really not the way to go because what goes around, comes around," Webster-Kerr warned at a press briefing yesterday evening.

Jamaica has now recorded 32 new cases in the last 48 hours, bringing the total number of confirmed COVID-19 cases in the island to 396.

Discrimination

Health Minister Dr Christopher Tufton said that the projections are that over a 12-month period, most Jamaicans are likely to be exposed to COVID. "So, to practice discrimination against the early infectors if you will, only may mean that you yourself may become a victim later on, and the probability of that happening could be greatly enhanced," Tufton said.

He added that the ministry is working towards silencing the stigma surrounding COVID-19 patients. This is now of even greater concern, as Tufton ponders of persons who have had the virus being reintegrated into society post treatment.

"COVID-19 stigma is a big issue because there is a perception around COVID-19 that it is a disease that people bring unto themselves, that they are going to contaminate others and a community that it is a curse of some kind and it will have a negative impact on a community. And so, people shun, ignore, rebuff and in some instances are even violent and threatened violence against persons who have COVID," he said.

Tufton holds that the opening of St Catherine this Friday may bring forth the largest test, given that so many companies pull their workforce from the parish.