THE number of persons in the COVID-19 Intensive Care Unit has increased to ten, while only one new case of the virus was recorded as at last Sunday, from 27 additional tests carried out within the past 24 hours.

This is an increase of seven new patients in the COVID-19 ICU, and comes just as the country recorded another death as a result of COVID-19 complications, after 25-year-old schoolteacher Donna Greaves died at the GPHC COVID-19 Intensive Care Unit (ICU) last Saturday.

Greaves, who hails from Lethem, Region Nine (Upper Takutu-Upper Essequibo), tested positive for the virus last Monday, before her condition started to deteriorate.
This brings the total number of recorded cases in the country to 273, which includes 120 recoveries and the 15 deaths, while the authorities are still monitoring 138 active cases. Some 2806 tests have been conducted so far, of which number, 2533 have proven negative.

According to the existing statistics, Regions One (Barima-Waini), Four (Demerara-Mahaica), and Seven (Cuyuni-Mazaruni) continue to have most of the cases.
Regions One and Seven, in particular, have seen a rapid increase in the number of cases being recorded. Last Thursday, this newspaper reported that COVID-19 claimed the life of Abdool Khan, a miner from Bartica, in Region Seven.

The spike of cases in Regions One and Seven have since seen authorities implementing a lockdown of those areas, with restrictions of travel in and out of the areas at reference.

Health authorities had found that a large number of positive cases in these regions, have no signs and symptoms, so they are what is known as asymptomatic. This means that these persons can transmit the disease, and the infected persons will not even know that they are sick, because there is no sign.

Medical teams were dispatched to Aranka and surrounding mining areas in Region Seven, as well as Moruca in Region One, to conduct mass testing in those areas to tackle the sudden spike of COVID-19 cases.

The continuous rise in the amount of cases has seen local authorities creating a special emergency unit to enforce the control measures, and curtail the spread of the disease. Authorities believe that the rise is primarily because sections of the population continue to flout the existing measures, which include a national curfew.