Doctor still cautious despite fewer COVID cases

Over the past few days, Jamaica has recorded less COVID-19 positive cases in comparison to the spike the island witnessed in past months.

There were nine cases on Sunday and 20 on Monday. But despite fewer cases being recorded, Dr Alverston Bailey is urging persons not to become complacent and flout the protocols as Jamaica is still in an active community spread phase.

"We are not out of the woods and are still in active community phase," he told THE STAR. "For a country to feel confident that community spread is abating, the positivity rate has to fall to at least four to five per cent and remain there for a few weeks."

Bailey says the daily confirmed cases "do not reflect the severity of the illness in a population".

"The epidemiological parameter we use is the positivity rate which is a marker of community spread and is the percentage of positive cases from the cohort of patients tested," he said.

Over the Christmas period, Jamaica saw fewer cases of COVID-19. This Bailey believes is simply because less testing was done.

"For example on last Sunday, only 138 tests were done because people were at home and I believe these tests were persons in the hospital, so naturally less positive cases will be seen," he said. "It doesn't in no way mean that the virus is going away it just means less persons were tested so there were less cases."

Jamaica, as of Monday, recorded a total of 12,752 confirmed COVID-19 cases, 298 deaths, with the most recent being three males from St James, St Andrew and St Ann, ages 81, 87 and 89, respectively.

Bailey adds that there are more fatalities in Jamaica than the US per 100 so persons should in no way think that fewer cases mean we are safe.

"The case fatality in America is actually better than Jamaica because more persons are dying from the virus in Jamaica than America per 100 based on research," he said. "Persons should not fall into a false sense of security by the total cases for the particular day COVID is still here."