GUYANA has now joined the list of just a few Caribbean countries able to test for the existence of the coronavirus with the presence of a virologist from the Pan American Health Organisation/World Health Organisation (PAHO/WHO) in the country.

This was announced by PAHO/WHO Representative, Dr. William Adu-Krow on Wednesday.
“I am happy to let you know that…we are one of the few countries to be able to do our own coronavirus [testing] as of today,” he stated. “He came yesterday and he came with all the [equipment] that he needed and, from today, we can do our own coronavirus testing.”
The virologist is located at the National Public Health Reference Laboratory and medical equipment brought along can also test for yellow fever. The Ministry receives daily updates and advice from PAHO/WHO on the global status of the virus. Dr. Adu-Krow commended the government for the proactive preventative measures taken to date.

“The main thing that we advised government is make sure that you are able to find cases early, contain them and manage them. I think the government has done a pretty good job so far. All vehicles and all planes coming from through any of our port of entries staff have been trained [to assess these],” he said.

Since the outbreak, port health authorities at the main official points of entry had commenced screening of all travellers from high-risk countries. Dr. Adu-Krow is pleased that, to date, there is no case in Guyana and that prudent management is being taken regarding a few persons who recently returned to Guyana from China and were placed under “home monitoring”.

Among the menu of measures put in place by the Ministry of Public Health officials are follow-up assessments via telephone calls and through daily visits over a two-week period on all persons who travelled from China to Guyana over the last month to check on their state of health. “The government is doing very well with that,” he said. “The fact that we don’t have a case and we are vigilant and our ports of entry have been tightened is good enough for me.”

He urged Guyanese not to be alarmed about the individuals simply coughing as it is now the flu season and there is no case of the coronavirus in Guyana.