SPEAKER of the National Assembly, Manzoor Nadir, has been re-infected by the dreaded novel coronavirus (COVID-19), while his family has also tested positive for this scourge, Clerk of the National Assembly, Sherlock Isaacs, said on Tuesday. The Speaker first tested positive for this disease in September, along with more than 14 employees of the Parliament Office of Guyana.
Isaacs told the Guyana Chronicle that while Nadir would have been asymptomatic during his first encounter with COVID-19, it is not the case this time, as he is displaying symptoms of the dreaded disease.

“The last time he did not have the symptoms and, on this occasion, he has the symptoms… he did not say how long he will be out for, but he has been carrying on from home. He chaired the sitting [on Monday] from home… so he is not bed-ridden,” Isaacs said during a telephone interview on Tuesday.
The Speaker, along with his family remains isolated at home, where they are being monitored by medical professionals.

So far, based on what was said by Isaacs, no employee of the Parliament Office or Parliamentarian has been advised to get tested for COVID-19.
It was reported recently that solid evidence of persons being re-infected by COVID-19 is yet to be recorded.
And, in Guyana’s context, information related to this virus is just over six months old, so a full analysis is not possible at this time. But Head of the COVID-19 task force at the Georgetown Public Hospital Corporation (GPHC), Dr. Mahendra Carpen, had said in November that two Guyanese, after being infected once and then recovering, have again showed symptoms of this disease.

For an infected person to be classified as ‘recovered’, he/she would have to do two periodic Polymerase Chain Reaction (PCR) tests, which would have to yield negative results.
This newspaper understands that the suspected cases of re-infection remain listed as undetermined, but are being closely monitored by medical professionals. The World Health Organisation (WHO) in April had cautioned world governments and patients who have recovered from COVID-19, that there is no “hard evidence” to prove that re-infection by the virus cannot happen.
The WHO cautioned countries against operating as if those recovered can face no new threat and therefore pose no threat to others, as this could add to the spread of the virus. .
With the long-term effects of this virus still unknown, authorities in Guyana have been keeping tabs on patients who recovered after experiencing the severe forms of COVID-19.